


Soul Wars

by Hijja



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, Rape/Non-con Elements, dark themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-16
Updated: 2020-06-15
Packaged: 2021-03-01 01:40:17
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 7
Words: 55,565
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23167120
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Hijja/pseuds/Hijja
Summary: The Dark Lord was dead. And now, Walden Macnair carried his killer out of the ruins of the Riddle House...(An alternative final battle against Voldemort and its aftermath)
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter, Lucius Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 26
Kudos: 112





	1. Barter

**Author's Note:**

> This is a story with an alternate ending to canon written in 2010 that I literally forgot to post. So it will probably be quite out of touch with current fanfic trends.
> 
> Please be warned of the NC-17 rating, non-con, dark themes and violence - if that's not your thing, please avoid!
> 
> Many thanks to my kind beta readers, Annephoenix, Lazy Neutrino, L. Meden and Melusina HP.

You may walk and you may run  
You leave your footprints all around the sun  
And every time the storm and the soul wars come  
You just keep on walking  
It's been this way from the start  
Everybody walking round with holes in the heart  
Everybody holding up skies in the dark  
As the stars keep falling.

( _Year of the Flood_ , Runrig) 

  


It was Macnair who bought the boy out of the ruins the battle had left of the venerable old Riddle House.

Of the five Death Eaters Lucius had sent into the crumbling fortress, Macnair was the only one to return. The others – Yaxley, Avery, the Carrows and one milk-faced neophyte whose name Lucius had never bothered to learn – had vanished as if swallowed up by the jagged remains of the elaborate oaken portals. Perhaps a ceiling had collapsed on them, or maybe they’d stumbled into one of the traps set by either side. Or possibly they had attempted to flee the battlefield, hoping against hope to slip past the Aurors who now, after the Order of the Phoenix had waged the actual battle, littered every inch of the hill with their presence and their Anti-Apparition Nets.

But Macnair returned, and at a distance, the bundle slung over his shoulder looked like nothing more than a spare set of robes. For an instant, Lucius felt a mingled stab of dread – and hope – that it might be the Dark Lord, escaping death through yet another transformation. 

The pain that still gnawed at the inside of his lower arm, however, told him differently. The scorched remains of the Dark Mark had burned a fist-sized hole into skin and flesh that he'd provisionally closed over with a healing film. The first time the Dark Lord had fallen, the Mark had burned too, the green snake inside the skull turning black and eventually fading, but it had not damaged its bearers like this. Several of the younger Marked Death Eaters had not survived its flare. 

No, the Dark Lord was dead. And now, Walden Macnair carried his killer out of the ruins of the battle.

When the ragged bundle hit the ground at Lucius' feet, it was hard to distinguish between black robes and hair, both equally covered with dust and grime. Only when Lucius rolled it onto its back with the toe of his boot did he recognise the boy underneath the dirt that liberally smeared his face. And the scar. 

At first, he thought the boy was dead. None of the sprawled limbs moved, and the curse mark stood out on his forehead as if touched with a burning iron. But then the face twitched in unconscious pain, green eyes cracking open into slits, and a screech of rage tore through the subdued quiet. 

Bellatrix Lestrange stormed forward, wand raised and aimed at the pitiful shell of a wizard. 

" _Cru-!_ "

Lucius intercepted her arm before she could finish the curse even though darkness mushroomed in front of his eyes for a moment when the pain of the scorched Dark Mark on his arm flared up again. Bellatrix hissed like a rabid cat, and Lucius held his own wand at the ready in case she should attack. Losing her Lord and her husband in the same battle had unhinged the already erratic mind of his sister-in-law to the point of outright lunacy.

"He killed our Master!" Bellatrix snarled, spraying Lucius' sleeve with saliva. "Vengeance will be ours at least!"

A look at Macnair's hard face told Lucius nothing about where the Executioner's own loyalties might fall. Of the few remaining adult Death Eaters, he, Bella and Macnair were the only ones still in fighting condition, and Lucius knew that he had to establish his authority quickly.

"I found him in the Dark Lord's throne room," Macnair stated gruffly, fingers travelling up to touch his axe in its shoulder sheath. 

Lucius' face twisted. "Snape?" he asked. "Greyback?"

"I saw Snape's corpse." Macnair's mouth thinned, but he didn't elaborate. "Of Greyback, not a sign."

"And our Lord?" interrupted Bella, voice hoarse.

Macnair shook his head. "There was no body – only debris." The coarse face hardened further. "And his wand. In pieces."

Bellatrix's cry of fury sounded remarkably like a sob, and Lucius had to grab her wand arm again. "He dies!" she spat.

"There are Aurors everywhere!" Lucius snapped at her, aware that his words were primarily for Macnair. "The only reason they haven't attacked and overrun us yet is that they're waiting for all their reinforcements to come in. And there are _three_ of us, with a handful of wounded and children." The haphazard wards thrown up around the graveyard wouldn’t hold the enemy for more than ten minutes once they finally decided to break them. Faced with two confused faces, he spelled it out. "Potter – alive! – is our only bargaining chip. Our ticket to freedom, Bella."

"Freedom?" Bellatrix's howl of outrage was so ear-splitting that even Potter, who had slumped back into unconsciousness on the ground, creased his forehead in unconscious pain. "Our master is _dead_!"

"But we are not," Lucius pointed out, enunciating very clearly. "Our children are not. And the Dark Lord would not want us to die in vain. He would want us to continue pursuing his goals in whatever way possible."

Never mind that the Dark Lord would most likely have expected them to die indeed, not giving a toss about anyone who survived his own demise. He’d never cared about anything but himself, Lord Voldemort.

Out of the corner of his eye, Lucius saw Macnair nod, almost imperceptibly. Perhaps Bellatrix saw it too, for she closed her mouth rather than spewing forth further protestations. 

It was amazing, in retrospect, how rapidly a battle four years in the planning had soured beyond hope. The giants, promised the free way of Britain by the Dark Lord, never came. Neither did Fenrir Greyback's werewolf pack, leaving the battle to the Death Eaters assembled in the Riddle House alone. To them, and to their immortal leader whose immortality backed out on him at the worst possible moment, it was hard to imagine that all those coincidences should have been engineered by the slip of a boy now lying at his feet.

Lucius grabbed Potter by the front of his robes and shook him until the tired green eyes snapped open.

“Our reinforcements – the giants – have you intercepted them?”

A bubble of spittle forms on Potter’s lips before words make it out. “Not coming. Hagrid… challenged their Gurg Golgomath. Won. Commands them now.”

Lucius' fingers tightened around Potter’s collar. “The werewolves?”

The boy’s mouth curled up in a ghostly smile at that. “Remus Lupin swore he’d take the pack away from Greyback, for what he did to him as a child.” He coughed, a convulsion that was rattling his entire thin frame. “There’s nobody coming, Malfoy.”

"Who's out there?" Lucius asked, hard. "Who's commanding the Aurors?"

Potter shook his head. It looked less like refusal and more as if the boy was trying to jog his thought processes. A milky film spilled across the usually clear, defiant eyes. His face twisted in pain.

Lucius drew his wand. " _Ennervate_!"

The boy's limbs jolted, convulsed, and he whimpered, drawing his arms around his middle as if his insides were on fire. If anything, the milkiness of his pupils increased further. 

Biting back a curse, Lucius pulled him upright again. "You blasted fool! What did you take?"

Potter's mouth moved twice before a sound came out, and Lucius had to bend his ear towards him to hear when he finally managed to speak.

"Coeur d'Empuis," Potter whispered through cracked lips, and Lucius barely managed to reign in the impulse to slap him, if only because it would knock Potter right out again. "Felix Felicis," the boy added after another pained swallow.

This time, Lucius cursed out loud. Coeur d'Empuis alone was a dangerous enough potion, allowing the drinker to focus his mind – and his magic – far longer, and far more strongly, than wizarding endurance would ordinarily permit. The price, of course, was utter physical exhaustion afterwards, or, in the worst case, a lethal breakdown. Not that Lucius hadn't employed the occasional sip himself, but to mix it with a second, even more volatile draught… 

"Who's in charge?" Lucius hissed again, before Potter could black out on them once more.

"Scrimgeour… I think," Potter slurred, before his lids drooped and he collapsed in a heap of cloth and limbs in Lucius hands.

Disgusted, Lucius let him drop to the ground. He wasn’t in any shape to start on any of the difficult healing charms that could be employed to alleviate potions poisoning; they'd have to rely on the amazing resilience that had so far kept Potter alive despite Lord Voldemort's every attempt on his life. Hopefully, that resilience would hold true for a bit longer. Not that Lucius cared a whit whether the boy lived or died, but they need a _breathing_ hostage. 

He turned to his associates. "It seems I will be having a chat with the Minister for Magic, then."

"They're going to kill you," Bellatrix pronounced, sounding almost cheerful at the prospect. 

Lucius shrugged dismissively. "I don't think so. Scrimgeour is a great one for protocol – in public. Still, if I should not come back…" He put a hand on his sister-in-law's wrist. "Have Draco use what he's been given by his mother. There might be hope for you after all."

Bellatrix stared at him, head cocked and with a deep frown on her pale forehead, but Lucius turned to Macnair and pointed at the insensible boy on the ground. "Make sure that he stays alive, Walden. And that he doesn't get lost."

Macnair nodded grimly. Lucius drew his black robes tightly around himself and walked the few yards over to where a marble mausoleum testified to the mortality of a Muggle family. From behind the cover of its walls, he could observe the ruins of the Riddle house, and the increasing number of black-clad figures swarming over the front lawns of the property. Most of the bodies littering the field had vanished already, while the remaining ones were being attended to by mediwizards. 

Lifting his wand, Lucius sent his messenger galloping ahead, a flash of bright-white racing into the front yard like a Patronus. Yet Lucius' Patronus had never had such a slender body, nor such a glorious, spiralled horn. The unicorn rose on its hind legs and whinnied a shrill challenge at the Ministry wizards who whirled around to stare at it, before dissolving into a white mist that slowly faded.

Tense in the shadow of his hiding-place, Lucius waited. It took several minutes – during which Lucius almost started to believe that his offer of parley had been rejected – until a silver light pierced the creeping dusk from the tightest knot of Aurors on the Riddle lawn. Less defined than Lucius' unicorn, it whooshed over the grass, then faded quickly. 

Two more measured breaths, and Lucius put his wand into his pocket holster and left his cover. Grass, still green but hardening under the August sun, crackled under his feet as he strode forward, out of the graveyard, onto the lawn, and towards the milling crowd in front of the house. His chest prickled from the angry stares he drew. It was a calculated risk, however. Rufus Scrimgeour might be as underhanded a bastard as any ex-Auror could be, but he wouldn’t break a wizarding parley in front of a hundred or more witnesses.

Lucius paused at a few feet's distance, taking in the scene before him.

Set somewhat apart from the Ministry people, he could see a handful of members of the Order of the Phoenix, crowding around a feather-bed stretcher over which the familiar form of Madam Pomfrey, Hogwarts' matron, was bent. Long, greying hair with black strands spilled down from it into the grass. Lucius had last seen Minerva McGonagall duel Bellatrix during the battle, and it seemed as if she'd come off the worse in that encounter. A handful of children were hovering around her, Potter's crowd most likely. A girl with dirty-blond pigtails was holding the Headmistress' pince-nez.

Then the crowd of Aurors parted and the leonine figure of Rufus Scrimgeour emerged, weathered face stern and not a hair out of place. A thin, bespectacled redhead – Weatherby Weasley, if he remembered correctly – followed him without looking at the Order crowd.

"You've come to surrender?" Scrimgeour presumed, speaking before he'd even come to a halt and managing to stare down at Lucius although they were of the same height.

Lucius allowed his mouth a twitch that signalled anything but amusement. "Not quite," he drawled.

"Your self-proclaimed Dark Lord is dead, your accomplices have been defeated, and the Dementors have returned into the fold of the Ministry." Scrimgeour's tone of cold disdain never wavered. "Surrender yourself and your fellow criminals, and your lives will be spared. The Kiss, however, will await everyone who spurns the Ministry's clemency."

"I am not asking for clemency, Minister." Lucius smiled without humour. "I am offering you a trade." 

"Trade?" Scrimgeour repeated with an arrogant tilt of the head. "You are beaten – what could you possibly have to offer us?" 

Lucius held the arrogant gaze pointedly. "Harry Potter."

"Potter?" A frown started to mar Scrimgeour's lined forehead, matched by the shocked intake of breath on part of the Weasley assistant creeping around behind him. "Potter fell in the battle against He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named."

"Not quite," Lucius repeated, if possible even more acerbically than the first time. "My... associates found him in the Riddle House. Alive – for now."

"Harry! He's alive?" The mere sound of Potter's name seemed to have drawn some of the Order members. The one crying out was the younger Weasley boy, the one Lucius had encountered before at the World Cup and later in the Department of Mysteries. Ronald, he recalled. Potter’s best friend. The Mudblood girl Granger – Draco's school rival at Hogwarts – was clinging to his arm. She stooped with her robes full of scorch marks and her hair a bird's nest, but was clear-eyed. The Minister's attaché stared, scandalised, as his brother interrupted the Minister for Magic.

"Nothing but a last-ditch attempt at saving their Death Eater hides," Scrimgeour waved away the interruption.

"Would you like to ascertain the truth of my words with Legilimency, Minister?" Lucius suggested mildly.

For the first time, he saw anger breaking through the stony mask of Scrimgeour's face. Other members of the Order had come up behind the two youths now: a brawny Auror – Shacklebolt, if Lucius' memory served – and a doddering old man with a top hat who looked old enough to have been around to witness Dumbledore's duel with Grindelwald. No, the Minister did not like to be manipulated in front of others at all.

When Scrimgeour raised his wand with an audible snarl, Lucius pulled the image of Potter, alive but weak as a kitten under his hands, to the forefront of his mind. Scrimgeour's Legilimency ripped into his mind with no finesse and even less care, and it took all of Lucius' willpower not to stumble to his knees. The spell tore at him, rubbing bare the exhaustion and pain Lucius would have preferred to suppress, and the howling grief beneath it. After making sure Scrimgeour had seen what he needed to, he slammed his Occluding shields back into place. They wouldn't have been enough to withstand the Dark Lord, but they were sufficient here.

Sweat beaded on Scrimgeour's high forehead, and his eyes narrowed in anger. "What are your demands?" he snarled, unmindful of the little sigh of relief that escaped the Mudblood girl. 

"A full pardon for the remaining wizards and witches who have fallen under the … pernicious control of the Dark Lord," Lucius stated.

"Out of the question!" Scrimgeour spat. "I have promised the wizarding public that no Death Eater will ever walk the streets of magical Britain again."

Lucius' opinion of Ministerial assurances expressed itself in a snort. "I am quite certain that the magical community would think it a small price to pay to ensure the return of the hero who slew He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named."

Scrimgeour's face closed as if a curtain was being pulled shut over it; a twinge of apprehension tugged at Lucius' stomach.

"No, Malfoy," the Minister said curtly. "The Ministry for Magic will not allow itself to be blackmailed."

"But... Harry!" the young Weasley cried, eyes almost comically wide. "You can't just abandon him! He defeated You-Know... Voldemort. They'll kill him!"

"I assure you that Mr Potter's safety is a top priority for me, Mr Weasley." Scrimgeour favoured the boy with a thin-lipped smile that didn’t come close to reaching his eyes. Lucius was well aware that the words were aimed at the adult Order members and the crowd behind Scrimgeour rather than at the boy. The Minister's expression became stern and superior when he turned back to Lucius. "Restore Mr Potter to us immediately, and you and your associates will be considered for... special privileges that can be reasonably offered. A full trial, improved prison conditions..." 

The heaviness in the pit of Lucius' stomach increased. Perhaps he'd gone about this the wrong way, approaching Scrimgeour like your average head-blind Gryffindor. Fudge’s successor had nothing to gain from Potter's return. Dead, the boy would make for a perfect martyr; alive, he’d be a living nuisance and a rival to the Minister's power. 

"Think, man," Scrimgeour added as if privy to Lucius' thoughts. "You can't be intending to throw away the lives of your son – your wife – for a bit of revenge!"

A part of Lucius that was way too close to the surface wanted to scream, wanted to whip out his wand and Crucio the man until they both went down in flames like those that had crowned Narcissa. Something of it must have been reflected in his expression, for Scrimgeour took a step back and the Aurors surrounding him raised their wands. With iron self-control, Lucius restored his features into their usual dispassionate mask. If Scrimgeour didn’t know about Narcissa, he didn’t need to find out now. 

"I'd rather see my son die in battle than locked away in Azkaban," Lucius stated. It was no less than the truth. He had experienced two years of Azkaban – he would never return, and neither would he ever allow Draco to see the insides of those spray-drenched walls. "If, however, a solution for the children of Potter's generation can be found, I might be able to convince–" he ventured.

"There will be no exceptions for anyone who wears the Dark Mark or has fought for He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named," Scrimgeour interrupted coolly.

By the look if it, the Weasley boy – and where were his parents, whose presence and influence might have made a difference? – was ready to yell again, but the Auror Shacklebolt put a hand on his arm. 

"Sir, if we attempt to exchange Potter for Malfoy here, it might–"

"No," Scrimgeour snapped. "I'll not have a wizarding parley in my name broken, and one of our oldest traditions debased." He spared the Auror a dismissive glance. "I think you should go back and tend to your mistress, Shacklebolt," he said with a nod towards the group clustering around Minerva McGonagall. 

Lucius watched Shacklebolt’s jaws clench, but he didn’t respond to the barb.

"You can't leave Harry to die," little Weasley persisted doggedly, and judging from Scrimgeour's expression, the Minister's patience was starting to wear thin. 

"Of course he can," Lucius threw in maliciously. "He just did."

"No! You always hated him because he refused to play figurehead for you!" The wand was in the boy's hand as quickly as any trained duellist's, and considering that it was aimed at Scrimgeour rather than at himself, Lucius had to admire the man's composure. 

"Ron!" the older Weasley gasped in horror. 

"Mr Weasley!" Scrimgeour boomed. "The strain of the battle must have addled your brains to draw against your Minister for Magic! I'm sure Mr Potter would _not_ want to be responsible for He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named's Death Eaters walking free once again." Behind the Minister, a group of Hit Wizards started to inch closer, a half-circle of wands aiming at the boy.

Just then the Mudblood girl groaned, grasped her stomach, and all but crumbled into Weasley's arms. Weasley dropped his wand to catch her, his expression torn between fear and rage. Granger's face was averted from the Minister, but Lucius could see her expression clearly: a fierce, calculated determination which – if it wasn't for her tainted blood – would have done a Slytherin proud.

"Your friend is injured, Mr Weasley," Scrimgeour said. "Take her to St Mungo's. There has been enough fighting today."

"Please, Ron," the girl whispered. With a curse, Weasley put his wand back into its sheath and wrapped his arm around Granger’s middle to hold her upright. 

Shacklebolt stepped forward between the two youths and the hedge of wands. "I'll take her," he announced gruffly, drawing Granger up into his arms. "She needs treatment – and the magical community needs to learn of what has happened here today."

"They will," Scrimgeour threw in icily, and the Mudblood turned her head into the shelter of Shacklebolt's arms.

"Yes – we'll make sure of that," she emphasised in a very firm tone of voice. Her eyes weren’t directed at Scrimgeour but at Lucius, burning as intently as a brush of Legilimency. 

There was a twin crack of Apparition and all three, Auror, girl and boy, were gone. 

"You've heard our conditions," Scrimgeour pointed out briskly. "If you return Mr Potter to us immediately, unharmed, and surrender, you can expect a fair trial and as much leniency in confinement as the Ministry can promise."

"I shall... convey that to my associates," Lucius said sarcastically.

Without a nod of acknowledgement, he turned and made his way back towards the graveyard. His back was itching from all the eyes – and wands – he knew were following his progress. He was certain that Scrimgeour would keep a truce given in public, but some of the others might give in to their rage.

He had seriously misjudged the Minister, Lucius realised while the grass crunched under his boots and the gravestones started to loom closer. He'd expected Scrimgeour to jump at the chance of becoming the saviour's saviour. There had been bad blood between Dumbledore and the Minister, and rumours that Potter and Scrimgeour had never seen eye to eye, but obviously hostilities had gone far deeper than that. If there was time, Lucius might just wait for the Order and the Ministry to tear each other to bits. There was no mistaking that Granger and Shacklebolt were planning to do exactly that, but Lucius and Draco and the others had an hour at most before the Hit Wizards descended on them, Potter be damned. Probably far less.

"What kept you, man?" Macnair growled out of the shadows when Lucius rounded the Muggle tomb and stepped down into the little hollow they'd turned into their hiding place. 

The Potter boy was lying at the Executioner's feet, cheek pressed into the grass, eyes closed and his limp black fringe covering his scar. He looked half unconscious again. The rope Macnair had used to bind his hands behind his back cut deep into his skin. 

"What did they say?" Walden added, pessimistic hope evident in his face. 

"They said no," Lucius snapped. "They don't _want_ Potter back, well, not unless we all tag along and walk into our little cages in Azkaban like good pets in exchange for a 'fair trial'." 

Bellatrix's shrill laugh rang across the little clearing. "Didn't I tell you, fool?" she cackled.

With a snarl of rage, Lucius pulled their prisoner to his feet. It took an " _Ennervate_!" to force the boy awake, and even then his eyes rolled in their sockets before alighting on Lucius without much comprehension. Lucius grabbed the front of his robes and shook him again. 

"Your friends don't want you back, Potter," he hissed, pent-up anger finding its target. "They'd rather see you dead than strike a deal." He took great pleasure in watching the hurt that flickered through the dulling green eyes, in the way Potter's blood-stained lips tried to form a voiceless syllable of protest. The boy's face was wet, but whether from tears or cold sweat Lucius couldn’t tell.

"At least we get to kill him now," Bellatrix laughed. "Let's make him pay. For our Lord – for us!"

"No," Lucius retorted. "He'll be of more use to us alive."

Black hair whipped her shoulders as she shook her head forcefully. "Alive? We'll all be dead anyhow!"

Before Lucius could formulate his response, a movement from the mausoleum distracted his attention. Light glittered on white, and then Draco stepped away from the marble wall like a ghost. His absent, drawn face was without expression. He hesitated before coming to a halt before Lucius as if he wasn't sure whom he's seeing. Grey dust still clung to his robes, although his hands were scoured clean. He looked half mad, Lucius realised with a pang of anguish; not that it would have been surprising – watching your mother flare up and crumble to ashes in your arms would do that to a child.

Like a sleepwalker, Draco reached up to his neck and took out a silvery chain from under his robe. Lucius winced when his son just pulled until the chain stretched taut. Red lines appeared on the thin skin at the sides of his neck until the chain snapped. Draco held out his hand, and Lucius had no need to inspect the tiny silver whistle to know what he was holding – and what it meant.

"Mother gave it to me when she came to the Riddle House," Draco said in a small voice.

"It's the Spray Whistle!" Bellatrix breathed. "Isn't it, Lucius? My sister must have been mad to give it into the hands of a boy."

"Or prophetic." Lucius lifted the small thing off Draco's palm and felt a cold from the depths of the sea radiating from it. Then he let it drop again and closed Draco's fingers around it.

"You'll have to blow it, Draco," he said, resisting the urge to pull the boy into his arms to wipe the expression of distant pain off his face. He couldn't afford to show weakness, and Draco might crumble altogether if he tried. "Get the others," he told Macnair and Bellatrix.

"What _is_ this thing?" Macnair growled. 

Draco didn’t seem to hear, so Lucius turned his head to explain.

"It summons the Spray Coach." Seeing incomprehension etched onto the Executioner's face, he added, "They say that Nimue, the Lady of the Lake, Transfigured a sea sprite into a coach to carry her son Lancelot across the sea from Brittany to England when he desired to fight for Arthur Pendragon. Centuries later, our ancestor Perseus Malefoi came into possession of the whistle. When he came to England, his arrival in the Spray Coach so impressed the head of the Wizengamot that he made him his chief advisor. The Spray Whistle will serve wizardkind three times before the sprite reclaims his freedom and return to the sea. My family has preserved the third request ever since."

"And that coach thing – it will carry all of us?" Macnair asked doubtfully. 

"All of us and more," Lucius nodded. "It is elemental magic. Now go and get the others, please – we don't have much time."

Lucius nudged Draco's shoulder gently, and moaned inwardly when the boy turned it over as if to wonder what such a thing might be used for. Watching Walden and Bella retreat towards the marble mausoleum where the survivors lay hidden, he touched the knuckles of Draco's hand. 

"Blow it," he repeated.

Finally, Draco lifted the whistle to his lips, never even wincing at the cold. 

There was no sound. Not even the wind crackling in the dry grass disturbed the quiet. And then came a rush, a gush of wind that tore at Lucius' hair, swirling and hissing with the tang of the ocean. An exuberant, uncontrollable shower of sea spray filled his nostrils with salt and wetted his cheeks. The carriage fell out of the August sky like chill incarnate, a green-grey thing that seemed bulky and made out of nothing at the same time, with oval, shell-blue wheels that dripped water and yet somehow managed to glide along seamlessly. Even knowing what to expect from the ancient tales heard at his great-grandfather's knee as a boy, Lucius had not quite believed in the existence of the coach until he saw it materialise before him. 

Only one horse was harnessed to the Spray Coach, a wild, blue-green creature with a body as ghost-like as a Thestral’s, and yet insubstantial except for smouldering orange eyes glaring at them with evil intelligence. Spray curled around its slender head in a frothing mane, and curved over one shapely flank to spread into a long tail trailing its hind legs. It pounded the ground with an impatient, barnacled hoof that made no sound and didn’t bend the grass. Neither did the wheels.

With stiff fingers that wanted to recoil from the icy, shell-encrusted material that could be metal, wood or stone, Lucius pulled the door handle. The door opened with a wet smack, followed by a trickle of seawater flowing down the stairs. 

Then he put his hand on Draco's back and led him into the coach. The cold, salt-laden air inside blurred, shifted for an instant, then solidified into opposite wooden benches. Lucius helped Draco to sit on one of the corner seats and wrapped his dusty cloak around the boy's shrunken shoulders. The whistle was clutched tightly in Draco's hand. 

Lucius climbed out again to make room for Macnair, who was pushing young Vincent Crabbe ahead of him, the semi-conscious bulk of Andrew Goyle half-slung over his shoulder. On Goyle's other side, Marcus Flint, arms covered in green blisters, tried his best to steer the moaning Death Eater up into the coach. It was painful to watch. Crabbe and Goyle, fathers and sons, had always had his own and Draco's back. Losing young Gregory and Vincent's father would be hard to get used to. Flint was the only one who showed unease at the sight of the Spray Horse; Macnair was too hardy, and Goyle and young Crabbe seemed no more aware of their surroundings than Draco was.

Lucius turned to see Bellatrix bringing up the rear, her inky hair a moving shadow in the approaching dusk. Alone. 

"Where is Rabastan?" he asked even as his eyes took in the fresh blood-stains on her sleeves. Her knife hung openly from her belt now, anchored by a scrap of black cloth.

"He won't come."

"Damn you, Bella!" Lucius ground out. He’d seen Rodolphus's body on the battlefield, his chest a mass of black blood and shattered bone, but Rabastan they might still have saved, if not his torn arm. There was no telling whether Bellatrix had believed Rabastan couldn't survive, or whether she’d wanted to make him her final sacrifice to Lord Voldemort's memory. Another piece of the past, gone. It filled his throat with bitter acid.

She threw him a mocking smile as she climbed past him into the coach, probably only too aware of how badly he wanted to drag her back outside and break her neck. 

From the hill beyond, voices were now approaching; it was time. Lucius bent down to drag the unconscious heap that was Potter off the ground and lift it up. A Seeker's build indeed – he was light as if he had bird bones or as if the Dark Lord had sucked half the substance out of him before surrendering to death. Lucius' mouth twisted. Perhaps the desperately frail creature could be made to serve a purpose after all.

He hurled the boy through the carriage door and heard him collapse on the slick wooden floorboards like a wet sack of bones. Then he followed, squeezing himself onto the bench next to Draco that his associates had wisely left empty. 

A deep breath and a look over the few heads who had survived the end of Lord Voldemort. Then he placed his hand over Draco's fingers that still held the whistle. 

"Let's go."

_~ tbc. ~_


	2. Binding

The ground was moving, Harry decided after some time. Which meant that he probably wasn't dead, because whatever he'd heard about the afterlife, nobody had ever claimed it would be _swaying_. Each and every one of his muscles ached; his head felt stuffed with cotton, and his fingers wanted to clamp around a wand that wasn't there. 

The air was cold and salty, and the floor his face rested on seemed to be made of icy wooden planks. A ship? The rushing of water filled his ears, but through it he could hear the faint murmur of voices. Once his head stopped swimming quite so badly, it became easier to understand them.

"…full of Muggles, and under Ministry supervision!" a hoarse female voice snarled from somewhere to the left. Something in its tone made him shudder, but he couldn't recall why. He didn't like that voice, though. 

"Good. They'll not look for us right under their noses." Another voice, male and drawling and familiar. Harry shivered, again not quite knowing why. "I will put us under Fidelius for extra measure."

"You can do that?" Another male voice, rough, lower. Not Hagrid, surely? Harry tried to lift his eyelids, but couldn't. He wanted to turn over, but even his wrist wouldn't obey. His hand stilled; even the tiny movement had exhausted his strength.

"Yes, I can do that." The first male voice again, the scary one, and finally Harry managed to crack an eye open. 

At first, all he saw were feet and robes. Then one of the feet, a black, scuffed boot, hooked into his side, cruelly bruising his ribs, and heaved him onto his back. 

A cold face, icy like the sea-smell and framed by a curtain of frosty hair, stared down at him. 

Oh God, Malfoy! 

Harry twisted in a frantic attempt to get onto his knees, but something… closed in his throat and he collapsed, convulsed by a racking cough that felt as if his body was trying to spit out his lungs. He tasted blood and felt it run, cool and sticky, from the corner of his mouth.

Malfoy's face wavered in and out into a white blur as Harry wheezed. A sudden onslaught of memories from the battle rushed into his fading mind.

_Voldemort, frothing with rage against the spells Snape and Wormtail cast to trap him in the throne room after Harry had entered, rendering him incapable of escaping or calling on his Death Eaters for reinforcement…_

_Snape, going down without a sound under Nagini's giant body in a tangle of coils and venom-dripping teeth..._

_Being slammed into the ground by the force of Voldemort's curses, again and again, fighting to stay conscious, to not let go of his wand, no matter how badly it creaks and threatens to splinter…_

_The light bridge of Priori Incantatem starting to form between their brother wands, and Harry clinging to it with every shred of energy left in his failing body to channel the Killing Curse._

_Green-tinged silver rearing up between them as Harry's mind and magic fling themselves against the enemy until his wand shatters in his hand. A green Patronus galloping towards the Dark Lord, and a shrill scream piercing his ears even as his scar is flaring with green fire and splits, blood running down his face._

_And, as the ceiling cracks and comes down on him, the knowledge that Lord Voldemort is gone._

And yet, he wasn't dead – unless the afterlife featured Lucius Malfoy. Who leaned down to touch him with his wand, ringed by Death Eater faces, and, just when the pain in his chest tinted Harry's world black, said, "Don't die yet, Potter. We can still use you."

The ripping agony dulled, and Harry sank back gratefully into the lapping waves of unconsciousness.

***

Harry still felt like a breathing embodiment of exhaustion when he next woke up, but at least this time, he _could_ breathe without choking. He was lying on the ground again, cold stone under his cheek rather than wet-smelling wood, and this time the ground wasn't moving. His body was contorted with his hands bound behind his back. His shoulder muscles ached. It was quiet.

Cracking open an eye, he found that he had been flung to the floor of a spacious room. A huge fireplace took up almost the entire wall. In front of it was a worn hearthrug, two massive oaken armchairs and an equally massive couch strewn with pillows. Their once bright colours had faded with age. The walls were stone, hung with tapestries that looked as faded as the pillows.

Seeing that he was alone, Harry rolled over onto his back. It meant squishing his hands and made him wince, but allowed him to view the rest of the room. A round oak door, closed. The view was a bit blurry – his glasses, cracked and bent out of shape in the final battle, were long gone. He couldn't even remember whether he'd still worn them when he'd woken up in a ring of Death Eaters in the Riddle graveyard.

A wide-open window, no – more an alcove with a wide window-sill to sit on, like in the boys' dormitories at Hogwarts. There was no glass pane, and the sky outside, from what Harry could make out from the floor, was a lively blue with the first grey-pink lining of dusk. A mournful cry had Harry flinching, and then a pale shadow hurled itself past the window. A gull. 

Azkaban? Harry wondered with a flash of anxiety. But although he'd never seen the wizarding prison, this just didn't feel like it. Stone floors and walls and ceiling, yes, but no oppressive atmosphere of gloom. Just an impression of age. And the Death Eaters had given up the fortress after liberating their prisoners, to mass around the Riddle House. Certainly they wouldn't oblige the Ministry by going back there voluntarily.

He wondered why he was still alive. Had the Death Eaters dragged him away with them to kill him later, at their leisure? He suddenly recalled Bellatrix's wild screams demanding his death, and shuddered. 

A faded tapestry with knots and flowers surrounding a golden unicorn caught Harry's attention. It neighed, pranced and let out a mighty sneeze at the dust kicked up by its movements. A weak smile tugged at Harry's mouth, but vanished when he heard steps outside the door. 

An iron lock creaked, and the door opened with a groan of disuse. Malfoy. Again, Harry saw the flash of unmistakable hair before squeezing his eyes shut once more and lying motionless. 

Steps approached until the tip of a boot dug into Harry's hip, not as cruel as an outright kick, but painful enough. He kept still nonetheless.

"Stop pretending, Potter," Malfoy's mocking drawl drifted down to him. "I know you're awake."

Harry pressed his lips together and opened his eyes. Lucius Malfoy looked like he had cleaned up a bit – his hair was clean and braided, the tears in his robes mended, the blood Scourgified away. He still looked haggard, though: the smooth, well-fed self-content facade was gone, replaced by lines and dark shadows of exhaustion. 

Harry hadn't heard the ferret enter, but when Malfoy moved aside, he saw him sitting very primly upright on the couch. He didn't sneer, or even pay attention – which was weird, Harry thought. He'd expected the little bastard to gloat heartily at the sight of his old enemy trapped and bound on the floor. Perhaps he'd been Confounded in the battle – he didn't look as if he comprehended much at all. His father, on the other hand, understood only too well.

Lucius Malfoy said nothing, just _smirked_ down at Harry with the sort of greed with which a Hogwarts first year might eye the opening feast during the Headmaster's speech. Harry felt a tense tug in his stomach that had nothing to do with the after-effects of the battle. He was almost glad when the door banged open again and Walden Macnair strode in, a nervous Flint in tow. Macnair still carried his axe in a shoulder sheath, but at least the blood had been cleaned off the handle. A knife with a bone handle hung in a neck sheath under his left ear.

The Executioner nodded at Malfoy. "I've put young Vincent to sleep with a Somnus – that should keep him out of the way for a while. Andrew... well, he'll live unless he goes into shock, but he's still unconscious..." His voice lowered with a side glance at the ferret. "If we could get him to St Mungo's, he might have a chance, but as it is..."

"Is his room secure?" Malfoy asked. "I don't want another incident of... mercy. There's few enough of us left as it is."

"Yes – she didn't go up there at all. Should be here soon, she said."

As if on cue, the door opened and Bellatrix Lestrange swept in, wearing a long, scarlet robe that was a century out of date and, despite Bellatrix's height, a few inches too long. The hems danced around her feet on the flagstones. Her tousled black hair wrapped her shoulders like a mantilla.

"Your Fidelius seems to work, Lucius," she announced, gathering up her skirts to sit – very closely – on the couch beside Draco, who didn't even glance up. "I've tried it out – an entire herd of Muggles passed right in front of me in the courtyard, blind as mice."

"Just keep your hands off them, Bella," said Lucius. "If you come at them with a curse or," he pointedly stared at the dark stains on her sleeves, "a knife, they _will_ notice."

"You've called us together to execute the Master's killer?" Bellatrix asked pleasantly, and exposed sharp white teeth at Harry. Draco took no notice of him at all, while Marcus Flint seemed careful not to look at him. 

Harry scrambled up into a half-sitting position, propping his back up painfully against the low table. It wasn't dignified and moving hurt like hell. But it beat lying on his back like an upended beetle.

"No, Bella," Lucius said calmly. "I told you before that he is our insurance policy." 

The woman snorted expressively. "They don't _want_ him, or have you already forgotten? I'm sure they think him dead already. Why not oblige them?"

With a malicious grin, Malfoy poked Harry's thigh with the tip of his boot. 

"How does it feel, Potter, to know that your friends cast you aside as soon as your destiny was fulfilled?"

Harry felt bitterness bubbling up inside him when the full impact of Malfoy's earlier taunts returned to the surface of his mind. It had been blurred by pain then – now, it was dagger-sharp. Malfoy wanted him to hurt – he would employ any lie to get what he wanted.

"My _friends_ ," he emphasised, "would never do that." His voice was raw, cracking in protest and less steadfast than he would have wanted. "Where am I?" he added for good measure. Better try for answers that might help him escape than give Lucius Malfoy an excuse to sneer at him further. 

"Tintagel Castle, on the Cornish coast," Malfoy told him. "My ancestors received it from the Wizards' Council when they arrived in England, and it was later donated to the Wizengamot to keep an eye on the Muggle ruins nearby. The wizarding castle proper is unplottable, invisible and shrouded in Muggle-Repellent Charms. However," he made an expansive gesture that seemed to encompass the room and more, "it has always been open as a retreat to the Malfoy family. Although they failed to mention that to the Wizengamot." A sharp, not quite humorous line appeared around his mouth. "Don't dream of escape, Potter. Even without the Fidelius, no one would seek – or find – you here."

Harry glowered, but Bellatrix rose from the couch before he could say anything. 

"Ah, but what _do_ you want with ickle Potter, then?" she asked, licking a scarlet bottom lip. "If his people don't _want_ him back…"

Malfoy smirked maliciously and reached down to pull Harry to his feet. His legs wobbled under him until he found himself half-leaning, half sitting on the coffee table. 

"They may not want him back," Lucius mused thoughtfully, "but they can ill afford to be seen to sacrifice him callously without inviting the fury of the wizarding public."

"A pity, rather," Bellatrix purred, crouching down on the table behind Harry so close her mouth almost brushed his ear. Her long nails dug into the vulnerable skin of his neck. "Such a pretty little nothing – I'd love to see it bleed and scream." Harry flinched and ducked away to the sound of her delighted laughter.

"I promise he'll be used as he deserves, Bella." An unholy light flickered in Malfoy's eyes as he looked down at Harry. "You will have your screams, I promise."

"What do you have in mind?" she asked eagerly, while Harry's mouth went dry with fear.

"I will bind him, Bella," Malfoy whispered, soft as a lover, never taking his eyes off Harry. "Bind him as a shield for our safety. Enslave him like a house-elf." He glanced up, a thin smile for the woman behind Harry whose razor-sharp nails were drawing blood on the back of his neck. "Redimio Cordis, Bella."

"Oooh!" She let go of Harry's neck and clapped her hands in childish delight. "The Bastard's Curse!" Even Macnair leaned forward, interest on his face. Only Draco's expression remained blank, his hands folded primly in the lap of his robe. "I didn't know you knew that spell."

"I studied it many years back on behalf of our Lord, for use on another boy who was, in the end, deemed too dangerous to live. Your cousin Regulus, Bella."

Bellatrix grimaced at the reminder of her family's shame. "You want him for yourself?"

"No." Lucius drew back, rising to his full height. "I can defend myself against my enemies, Bella." He put a heavy hand on the ferret's shoulder. "I will bind him to Draco."

Draco's pale face lifted a little at the sound of his name, but otherwise showed no reaction. Harry's own gut churned nervously. He'd never heard of that spell before, but Malfoy's open malice and Bellatrix's glee worried him. Whatever it was, it would not be to his liking. 

"But Lucius," Macnair threw in, thoughtfully fingering the handle of his axe, "that's blood magic – to control and enslave the… missteps of our pureblood heritage. You may share blood with the Potters somewhere in your family tree, but not nearly enough to lay claim to him."

"True,''' Malfoy admitted smoothly. "And this is where Bella comes in."

The woman hopped off the table, scarlet skirts swinging. A deep frown marred her face. "There is no more Black blood in baby Potter than there is of Malfoy. We don't breed with blood traitors." 

"Oh, you do," Harry muttered, under his breath, but audibly enough. "You just try to burn them off the family tapestry after."

Bellatrix whirled around and slapped him, then cradled his burning cheek in her palm and drew a long, bleeding scrape along his cheekbone with her nail. Harry felt the blood drip down to his neck. His stomach roiled. 

"You're bound to him by magic, not blood," Lucius clarified. "He's your first cousin's godchild, a bond as powerfully magical as blood. Your cousin was a strong wizard. Certainly the saintly Potters would have wanted no less for their 'child of prophecy'." He looked Harry over, an ugly smirk twisting his mouth. "If Bella claims him, in Black's name, for Black-"

"A halfblood?" the woman shrilled. "He's nothing but vermin!"

"I'm not asking you to name him heir to Black," Lucius snapped, his hand tightening a little on Draco's shoulder. "Just to lay claim to him, and then give him to Malfoy."

"Well, if he were a child," Macnair interrupted, leaning forward. "But he is of age – his own, not his bloodline's."

"He's never been his own all his life." Lucius wiped a drop of blood off Harry's chin and rubbed it between his fingers. Something inside Harry's chest went cold. It felt like a violation. "He's been slave to his Muggle mother's family, slave to Dumbledore, to the Order, to the Prophecy. If he had become his own since coming of age, he'd not be here today."

Malfoy shook his head and wiped his fingers fastidiously on a handkerchief. "There's more to coming of age than years passing, and this one has not moved away from bondage. It's a risk I am prepared to take."

"I'm nobody's slave," Harry yelled, teeth bared. The insinuation that his life – his sacrifices so far – made him less than free was unbearable. 

"Not yet," Malfoy conceded. "But you will be."

"I won't!" Harry snarled, but a wand-flick glued his tongue to the roof of his mouth and reduced his words to a panicked, mewling noise. 

"Will you aid me?" Lucius stared at Bellatrix, who hesitated with a curl of distaste to her nose that reminded Harry vividly of her sister at the World Cup.

"Very well," she said at last. "There's not much Black blood left to dishonour by this." She held out her hand imperiously.

Lucius locked his fingers around Harry's bound upper arm so hard his flesh prickled, then shoved him roughly at her. 

Struggling despite his bound hands, Harry felt her claw-like fingers dig into his shoulders before he found himself hurled onto the couch next to Draco, who turned his head to watch with detached interest. 

Bellatrix's quick " _Petrificus_!" caught him just as he tried to scrabble away, and he bounced back onto the dusty upholstery like a sack of flour. He could turn his neck a little, but that was all.

Bellatrix leaned over him, lips twisted in a blood-red smirk that was almost mischievous, and for the first time Harry recognised, through the panic-stricken thumping of his heart in his petrified chest, an echo of Sirius in the inky hair and wild face. 

She dissolved his bonds and pulled away the tattered remains of his robe, exposing beaten trainers, old jeans and the soft grey sweatshirt that had been Dudley's as a child and had somehow survived hundreds of washing cycles. One elbow was torn beyond repair and soaked with Harry's blood where Voldemort had smashed him onto the flagstones. 

Macnair took a step towards Bellatrix and lowered his head to draw the small knife from his neck sheath, then offered it to her. Grin deepening, she took it from his hand and ran the blade down the worn fabric. It parted without a rustle. When she pushed the flaps away to expose his chest, Harry's face started to burn despite the proximity of the blade. Her palm touched his crawling skin, one long nail grazing the nub of his left nipple. Icy fingers came to rest right above his heart, and the grin deepened. She _had_ to feel it hammering frantically inside his chest. 

In a sing-song voice that echoed her taunts in the Department of Mysteries, she said: "I claim this child, Harry, bound by magic to the Noble and Ancient House of Black, for the House of Black by blood-right."

The skin on Harry's chest tingled under her hand, and, unbidden, Sirius' face rose in front of his inner eye – young as he'd been in his parents' photographs, then twisting into the ragged Azkaban escapee Harry had met in the Shrieking Shack, then to the grinning warrior who had taunted his cousin in battle right before plunging through the Veil. 

Then the tip of the knife touched the thin, defenceless skin below his throat. Harry tried to recoil so hard it made the muscles in his neck creak, but he was trapped by the Petrificus, stuck against the couch. 

A small cut left blood welling up, terribly _intimate_ as if a part of himself was spilling down his throat. He felt enveloped by the scent – acrid like burning wood in autumn – that rose from her hair as she bent over him and pressed her lips to the cut. Her rough tongue snaked out for a taste, and he could see revulsion radiating from her face even though it was hidden against his chest. 

"Filth!" she hissed, glaring up at him hard-eyed, then closed bloody lips around her left middle finger and bit down, slow and deep until red spilled up, dripping from the bite and staining her teeth red.

There was a sharp intake of breath from the left, where Marcus Flint crouched uneasily on an armchair, but none of the other Death Eaters looked bothered. Only Lucius' mouth, Harry's flitting eyes registered, was curled down in an unconscious grimace of distaste.

With a giggle, Bellatrix stared at her blood-dripping finger, then gave Harry a scarlet grin. Focussed on the gory display, the wand tip touching his temple caught Harry utterly unawares. 

" _Imperio_!" she hissed. 

Harry's mouth snapped open in shock, and at the same moment her finger slipped between his lips. He closed his mouth around it, sucking and swallowing bitter iron in a curse-hazy bliss. He caught himself, and his battle-worn mind still had enough willpower to fight off the Unforgivable, but she'd already pulled back, throwing her head back in a shrill laugh of delight before grabbing his hair at the nape of his neck and pulling him forward, pressing her mouth to his in a crushing, open-mouthed kiss that smeared and mingled the blood on their lips. His howl of rage stifled, Harry tried to bite her lip, but she was already dancing out of the way, wiping his blood off her lips. 

"Blood to blood - welcome to Black, itty dirtblood baby!" She pirouetted, skirts dancing around her ankles, and dipped a mocking curtsey to Lucius. "Not that Black wants the likes of you. He's all yours, brother-in-law."

"Let's make him all Draco's, then," Lucius drawled, ice-grey eyes wandering over Harry's blood-smeared mouth and grimy face in a way that had Harry shrinking inside. Malfoy smiled at him, a bare glimpse of canines that were more wolfish than human, then it disappeared as if wiped away when he turned to Draco, who still sat unmoving at the other end of the wide couch Harry had been thrown on. 

Malfoy went down on one knee and took his son's hand, then cupped his chin with the other to make him look up. 

"Be strong for a little while longer, Draco." There was an odd gentleness, almost fear, in Malfoy's voice that Harry had thought beyond the emotional range of such a sadistic bastard. He craned his neck, desperate to see what was coming, what he had to steel himself against. 

Bellatrix moved away and settled down on the hearthrug next to Macnair's chair, skirts artfully spread around her. She wiped the small knife on her sleeve and offered it back to Macnair with a sweet smile.

Lucius drew his wand, and Harry's mouth went ash-dry. A swift " _Accio_!" pulled him forward until he crouched right next to Draco, twisting his bound arms in the process. It left him lying half on his back, face pinched. Malfoy grabbed him and pulled him into a sitting position. His already mangled shirt came apart in tatters in Malfoy's fist, revealing more white skin mottled with bruises. 

The wand tip aimed directly at his chest, and a frosty light hit him just above the breastbone, while Malfoy's mouth formed words too softly for Harry to understand. The feeling that surged through Harry wasn't pain; instead, it was a longing so deep it forced a whimper out of him. The ice light shone right through every shield he'd ever built up around his soul. It peeled off his protections, burned them away layer by layer. The comforts, the lies he'd told himself to make his childhood, the prophecy, the deaths bearable until he felt that all that was left at the core of him was a red, pulsing ball of longing. For a family, for affection, for a sense safety not qualified by demands or resentment. 

He couldn't move a muscle under the ice-light, was literally frozen into place. But even if he could have moved, he wouldn't have been able to even think of fleeing. Tears spilled out from under tightly-closed lids and found their way down his face in cool trails, but although he was vaguely aware of crying, it didn't shame him. There was no room for shame left inside him – only for longing.

Even when Malfoy moved his aim away from him and at his son, the frozen feeling persisted. The light that swept over Draco wasn't white but a soft pink, like clouds touched by the sun in the first hours of a summer morning. Yet Draco too trembled, his mouth forming an 'o' of surprise which was the strongest reaction to any stimulus he'd shown so far.

Light swirled, white and pink, around Malfoy's wand hand, and although Harry's vision was blurry, he could see that the man's very hair was standing on end.

A jerky snap of Malfoy's fingers, and the cord that bound Harry's wrists snapped free. Blood streamed back in to the deadened limbs in a rush of pain that squeezed more tears from Harry's eyes. He bit his lip, and only realised when Malfoy pulled him up by the arm that the Petrificus had lifted too. 

Malfoy lifted Harry's wrist and bent over it, pressing his lips to the pulse point with just the slightest touch of teeth. It didn't hurt. It felt almost soothing to Harry's shredded self. 

Then Malfoy took Draco's limp hand in his, pressed their wrists together and touched them with his wand. Dark blue flames spilled from the tip, full of frizzing white and pink sparks. They stung Harry's skin and he felt Draco flinch beside him, but neither of them could pull back. It was as if the flesh at their wrists had fused. 

Bellatrix shook her head as she leaned over to watch, licking her lips as Lucius spoke.

"Impure blood to augment the pure, the fake heir sheltering the true..."

Harry could see the muscles on Malfoy's arm stand out as his wand creaked with the force of the spell. 

Before Harry's face, Draco's eyes closed, his face bone-white and pained. Lucius stepped closer until Harry could feel his robe-clad thigh against his own, and unlaced the string fastenings of Draco's shirt. It fell open and revealed a thin chest marred with familiar gashes, healed now into fading lines instead of gaping and gushing blood as Harry had last seen them. His eyes met Lucius' and skittered away again, burned as much by the cold he saw there as by the blue flames. The man grabbed Harry's unlinked hand and pressed it, palm open, against Draco's scars. Another flick of the wand, and the blue fire spread where they touched, turning Draco's skin into a blue-tinged, translucent film that Harry feared he would just sink into if he exerted any pressure.

"The lower serving the higher," Malfoy intoned again. "Debts paid. Blood bound. Destinies… conjoined!" 

Almost in dual vision, Harry saw panic – outrage – slip into the vague pain on Draco's face while the blue fire pricked them. Lucius' face was a grimace of effort, with sweat dripping down his temples. His wand strained as though trying to escape the magic.

Prickling and itching all over from the invasive presence of the spell, Harry hoped the fire would just shatter Malfoy's wand as it so plainly wanted. As if in suspended animation, Lucius' mouth moved and whirls of blue fire flickered over their heads. 

"Unitas… in servitudo. _Redimio… Cordis_!"

Harry shrieked aloud as Draco… rushed towards him, not physically, but somehow smothering him in his essence, mind and blue fire until Harry felt like he was spilling out of his own skin. 

_He_ was _Draco, riding a toy broomstick over the manicured front lawn of a manor house; he chased angrily screeching peacocks through a large, formal garden; he looked up at himself standing on a chair at Madam Malkins', ridiculously young and nervous; he was running away into a shelter of black trees in the Forbidden Forest, glancing over his shoulders at Harry's back making a mad stand before a monster stained with unicorn blood; he knelt before the Dark Lord in eager anticipation, receiving his task; he was bleeding and twitching in agony on the dripping floor of the prefects' bathroom, staring into Harry's eyes once more and knowing beyond doubt that any time now the final curse would hit; he faltered before Dumbledore on the tower, burning with grief and resentment and then, in sudden, unbelievable shock, watched the old man tumbling over the balustrade from Snape's curse._

_And finally, he was trembling on the battlefield among the ranks of You Know Who's diminished army, trying to stay at the back out of curses' range; watched a Fiendfyre creature manifest and charge through the rows of milling fighters – right at him; stood frozen in terror as the thing – a fiery unicorn with a red-hot drill of a horn - sidestepped his father's Aguamenti, rushing closer, closer… until Narcissa Malfoy stepped right in front of it, her wand flaring once, then turning to ash in front of her. The smoking creature rose above her with a howl, enveloping her, then burst into a shower of sparks, leaving behind a crisp husk that barely resembled a human being..._

Draco's cry filled Harry's head as he stumbled backwards. Gone was the blue fire that had tied him physically to Draco. And yet Draco's despair pounded Harry in waves as he crumbled to the ground. Barely conscious, he watched Lucius turn his wand on his trembling, rage-filled son and tumble him back onto the couch with a sleeping charm. 

The turmoil in Harry lessened at that, although the final impact of Narcissa Malfoy's death left him retching dryly with his cheek pressed against the floor. The charred smell, Draco's piercing sense of loss and guilt...

Lucius deposited Draco's limp form in Macnair's arms with exquisite care, and the ghost of the Executioner's grip brushed Harry's own skin.

"Take him to bed," Draco's father said, watching Macnair carry the boy away before leaning down to pull a shaking Harry to his feet. Harry had to lean against him to prevent himself from falling right over.

"What did you _do_ to me?" he croaked, barely recognising his own voice. 

"I bound you to my son," Lucius said, eyes cold and devoid of any recognisable human emotion. "If Draco suffers, you will suffer; if he is miserable, you will be too. If he dies, you die."

Pure dread coursed through Harry's exhausted blood. "No!" he groaned out his denial as pain and exhaustion nearly buffeted him into unconsciousness. As if from far away, Bellatrix's tinkling laugh rang in his ears.

"You will serve Draco and protect him against every enemy and discomfort," Lucius continued, his voice full of bright malice. "Because you won't be able to do anything else." He lowered his head until his mouth almost touched Harry's ear. "Do you think that's payment enough for the crimes you've committed against my family?"

Twisting his arm up behind his back, Lucius pushed Harry's stumbling body towards the door through which Macnair had exited with Draco. Outside the window, night had fallen, a blanket as dark as the sea below. It filled the corners of Harry's vision when Lucius stopped at the bottom of the stairs and leaned forward, tightening the grip on Harry's twisted arm even further. 

"No, Potter. It isn't enough. You haven't even begun paying yet." 

__

_~ tbc. ~_


	3. Bedding

It was almost like dragging an unruly child to his room, Lucius decided as he hauled Potter's struggling form up the stairs. The boy stumbled worse than a toddler. If exhaustion hadn't been carved into every line of his body, Lucius would have suspected that Potter wanted to provoke him into knocking him out cold. Finally, Lucius grabbed him round the middle to support him up the endless staircases, overriding his feeble struggles. 

He felt exhausted too, more magically than physically, but the old, intimate ritual had also given him a restless buzz he needed to exorcise. 

His bedchamber, requisitioned because it was spacious, had a huge four-poster and fireplace, and was quite a stretch away from the dungeon quarters above Merlin's Cave that Bellatrix had favoured. It was also located right next to the elder Goyle's sickroom, but he wasn't going to think about that now. His room had been aired and cleaned by the silent, stoic clan of house-elves that had serviced the wizarding castle of Tintagel for centuries.

When Lucius threw open the massive oaken door and hurled his captive inside, he took in the sight of the roaring fire and the clean, herbal scent of the sheets. Excellent.

Potter came to a wobbly halt in the middle of the room just as Lucius pulled the door shut behind him. The dark-ringed green eyes flitted nervously from Lucius to the bed and back. It made Lucius' lips want to pull back from his teeth, and he permitted the impulse. Potter flinched visibly. 

"Yes, Potter." Lucius inclined his head towards the bed and continued in his most ominous drawl. "Your little war killed my wife. And while you have nothing to make up for that, I can at least take some pleasure from that pretty body of yours."

Even though Potter's look of horror gave him a vicious thrill, Lucius was telling the truth. He had loved Narcissa Black, and after getting to know her during the intricate dance of their wizarding courtship, had never wished for a different partner. Lucius had admired her beauty, perfectly complementing his own colouring and temper, and even more the knife-sharp, merciless mind it hid. But his wife's body had never truly roused his passion. Although Bellatrix's behaviour had repelled him, he'd always been drawn more to the other Black sisters – his preference ran to slender, dark and fiery, of which Potter was a perfect embodiment. Like Regulus Black, a long time ago. 

Nicknamed 'The Bastard's Curse', Redimio Cordis had been devised to restrain by-blows and unduly ambitious younger sons of noble wizarding houses from posing challenges to a true heir, _and_ give them a powerful backup in the process. Of course the Wizengamot, always eager to interfere, had outlawed it in the 1770s, but the House of Black had last recorded its use in 1891. Lucius himself had found the curse in Orion Black's rare copy of _The Pure Blood House Maintain'd_ while courting Narcissa. 

Plotting to use it on the Black's young scion to put to rest the Dark Lord's doubts about the boy's loyalties, Lucius had looked forward, once, to having proud Regulus tied to him by Redimio Cordis before events had proceeded too fast for his subtle plans. Now, the thought of Potter, bound to his son and chained to his bed, seemed just as delicious. 

Potter's lips went very pale, and he took an involuntary step back under Lucius' hungry gaze. It roused the predator inside Lucius, and a slow-boiling anger that had bubbled away ever since Narcissa's death and his encounter with Scrimgeour. Potter wasn't even the focus of his rage, but he was present and would make an excellent target for revenge. 

Lucius drew his wand, holding it casually between two fingers and watched Potter's hand close nervously around the bedpost. His fingers tightened, as if he would much rather clench them into a fist and slam it into Lucius' face. 

"Don't worry, boy, I won't make you undress for me," Lucius purred. "That's what we have magic for."

He cast the spell to Vanish Potter's clothes, caring nothing about the hand the boy threw out protectively in front of him. Before Potter could cover his nakedness, Lucius had pushed him onto the bed. The boy froze. 

Lucius swept his eyes over the body displayed for his enjoyment. Potter would never be handsome. His body had yet to shed the gangliness of adolescence which, in clothes, he hid quite well through his rigid posture. His knees were knobbly, his skin too pale and marred by bluish bruises left by the healing charms Lucius had expended on him the night before. Barely any body hair, Lucius registered, apart from a dark fuzz in his armpits and pointing down to the thatch of black at his groin that was, if anything, even more untamed than the one on his head.

Nevertheless, a wiry strength was evident in Potter's musculature. Together with the expressive face and the nervous energy that seemed to run like a live wire through Potter's body even when his resilience was at its ebb, it sent a thrill of anticipation through Lucius. He did not want Potter for his looks, after all. Not by a long shot.

As soon as Lucius lowered his wand, Potter scrabbled to the side, trying to get off the mattress. Without a comment, Lucius reached out and pushed him back. The boy didn't fight back, just rubbed the back of his hand over his mouth and shook his head in disbelief. "You can't want me!" His voice was rough, almost cracking.

Lucius smiled, all teeth. "Who said anything about want, Potter?" He revelled in the way Potter cringed back towards the headboard. "Revenge will do."

Crouching down, one knee dipping the mattress, Lucius touched the wand to Potter's cheekbone. This time, the boy didn't move back. He sat there petrified.

"Don't do this," Potter whispered, sounding as if he was going through the motions of a protest he didn't quite believe was warranted. 

Lucius smiled and put his free hand on the boy's hipbone, enjoying the feel of Potter's flesh prickling over with goose pimples under his fingers. "But I will, boy."

Without hesitation, Lucius settled down next to Potters side. The boy pulled his knees up to hide his genitals, all but curling himself into a ball. 

"In fact," Lucius continued dispassionately, "it should be Draco to have you. The final component of Redimio Cordis is commonly performed by the wizard or witch it benefits." He stroked Potter's hip again, then let his fingers travel up Potter's side. "The ritual took control of your mind as an independent thing – now, I will take your body from you as well."

At this, Potter's fists clenched and for the first time, the spirit of the fighter flared in his eyes. It filled Lucius' stomach with a warm buzz. 

While Draco had just shut himself off from the world after witnessing Narcissa's death, Lucius had seen the horror splashed vividly across Potter's face when the ritual had forced him to share the memory. Then again, Potter wasn't a Malfoy and hadn't been schooled to hide his emotions – the hurtful, vulnerable ones, anyway – even before he'd left the cradle. Maybe it _was_ advantageous that he, Lucius, would be the one to break Potter's body to his will. This way, the boy would focus his hatred on Lucius, not Draco. 

"Fight me, boy," he warned, leaning towards Potter's ear. "Fight me, and I'll hurt you 'til you bleed, and curse you into submission before taking you. I can easily chain you to the bed and rip my pleasure from your struggling body."

He illustrated his words, slamming Potter back into the pillows and wrapping a hand around his throat hard enough to bruise. Potter's pulse fluttered under his fingertips; his neck was slick with nervous sweat. 

"Or," Lucius continued softly, forcing Potter to lie very still to hear, "I could cast Imperius and make you beg to cater to my most depraved desires."

If anything, the boy's expression turned even more horrified.

"Let me help you choose," Lucius whispered against the delicate shell of the boy's ear. His wand tip touched Potter's chest. " _Imperio!_ " 

It was a testimony to the boy's exhaustion that the spell plunged him right under without a second's resistance. Potter's eyes went wide and unfocussed. The pinched expression drained from his face, and his clenched fists loosened. 

Lucius cupped the boy's cheek in his palm. "Kiss me," he ordered.

Potter leaned forward and brushed his mouth without hesitation, the dutiful peck a child might give an insistent aunt. Lucius smiled at the boy's literal-mindedness.

"And now, kiss me because you _want_ me."

Even after witnessing Potter's initial surrender, Lucius was surprised by the speed with which he found Potter moulding himself against him in a way that left nothing, not even the stirring in the boy's nether regions, to the imagination. Potter's mouth was hot and dry, and a flush spread over his skin when Lucius cradled him against his body to enjoy the kiss. 

Potter kissed as though he wanted to keep nothing of himself, his bare cock stiffening as he pressed himself against the front of Lucius' robes. Lucius gave in to the temptation to squeeze one of the boy's pert buttocks, only to have Potter moan into his mouth and wrap his arms around his neck as if he wanted to crawl _into_ him. 

Lucius enjoyed the hot mouth and pliant body for a few long moments, then disentangled himself from the boy and pushed him away. 

His wand flashed, and Potter shuffled back with gooseflesh erupting all over his skin. He wiped the back of his hand over his mouth. His eyes were wide and full of horror. 

"What?" Lucius asked. "This is how it _could_ be. And I dare say it would be sweet. The choice is yours." 

Potter shivered deeply, his face almost grey. He shook his head.

"The point is, however," Lucius murmured, letting his hand trail over Potter's bare chest, "that I've had a few rather bad days. I don't particularly want to make this a battle." He curved sharp fingernails around the nipple he encountered, and felt Potter jerk. He smiled and leaned over the boy. Potter had his fists clenched again, but looked as if he couldn't quite bring himself to use them on Lucius if shoving him away meant touching his skin. He had to feel the tickle, however, where Lucius' braid had fallen onto his belly.

"Surrender, and I won't hurt you," Lucius whispered, then caught himself at the image of Potter writhing under him with tears in his eyes. "Not as much as I could if I wanted to," he amended.

A shudder ran through the boy, and he curled himself up even more tightly.

"I don't think I could," Potter told his knees.

Lucius almost smiled. There was something about that huddled, defeated creature that almost moved him. Almost. Potter was practically at the end of his strength, physically and mentally. All he could do was break. The only thing left to discover was where his fault lines ran.

"I will settle for serious intent," Lucius assured the boy, only to see despair etching itself even deeper into Potter's face. His hands shook. At last, he closed his eyes, his lashes turning into smudged, imperfect dark curves. He swallowed hard. Nodded.

"I'll hear it in your own words, if you don't mind," Lucius said, knowing that Potter did mind, and intensely so. 

"Yes!" the boy spat at last, lips thin as razor blades. Drawn by the tense line of his chin, Lucius took it between thumb and index finger. 

"We'll see," he whispered before closing his lips over the boy's. 

Potter froze, so much that if Lucius hadn't shared the Imperio kiss, he would have wondered whether he'd ever kissed anyone, or would break his promise right away. He put his hand on the back of Potter's skull, feeling the soft hair against his palm as if stroking a pet. Kept it there very lightly, not exerting pressure, just a subtle reminder of what Potter had let himself in for. 

Potter went infinitesimally less rigid, and Lucius smiled against his cool lips. 

"I'll have to teach you to do better than this," Lucius announced, drawing back. Pink spread across the boy's cheeks as Lucius ran his hand over his chest and pushed him back. "Now, I want you to lie down," he said, stroking Potter's arm. "Lie down and hold on to the headboard with both hands, and do not let go. Can you do that?"

Potter started to nod, then bit his lip. "I..."

"You don't know," Lucius finished for him. "Let's find out, shall we?"

He put a bit of force into the push on Potter's chest and watched the boy lower himself onto the bed with all the reluctance of a prisoner climbing onto the rack. It seemed to take extraordinary efforts for him to stretch his limbs. When he clasped his hands around the wooden carvings of the bedposts, stretching delightfully, Lucius could see that his knuckles were white.

He smoothed his hand over the boy's trembling flank. That intriguing body should be Draco's – would be Draco's! – but for this night, Lucius would have it. He allowed himself a predatory smirk at the flush that burned high on Potter's cheek at the touch. Unlike Draco, he knew exactly what to do with it.

Potter's eyes flickered with disbelief when Lucius unfastened his robe without taking his eyes off his trapped young captive. He threw it over the arm of a chair; the anti-wrinkling charm woven into the fabric would take care of it. Lucius settled down on the side of the bed next to Potter's outspread body, still wearing the thin, loose draw-string trousers of wizarding tradition. Slowly, he started to run his hands over Potter's tense flesh – no roughness, or tickling, just firm, slow stroking that warmed Potter's chilly flesh. The boy managed to stop himself from squirming, but it took visible effort. 

Potter bit down on the inside of his cheek as Lucius scraped a nail across his nipples - the first sharp touch in a sea of reassuring ones, and spicy for that alone. His glare was delightful. 

Lucius met it with a smirk before taking the boy's stubborn chin into a gentle grip. Potter's eyes flickered nervously as Lucius prodded his chapped bottom lip over a barrier of clenched teeth.

"Compliance?" Lucius chided lightly, as if it was a question. Potter's eyes flashed steel for a moment, then his jaws unlocked and he allowed Lucius' thumb to slide into his mouth. His tongue was warm and rough as it skittered along the pad and nail, and Lucius permitted himself a shiver of arousal at the thought of how it would feel on his cock.

Potter sucked on his thumb without being bidden although shame flamed across his face. When Lucius added his index finger, he ran his tongue over and around both until Lucius pulled them from his mouth and wiped away a bit of drool at the corner of Potter's mouth. 

He pinched the boy's nipples with wet fingers, the wetness both soothing and chilling the stiff nubs. Potter squirmed sluggishly, but there was no disputing the slight swelling at his bare groin. Lucius smirked and teased him a bit more, just for the pleasure of it, until Potter's nipples were red and hard. 

Then he rose from the mattress and took off his shirt with deft, decisive movements. Potter's eyes were on him, narrowed in mild disbelief as if he'd only now realised what was going to happen. There was no disguising the ugly scar on his forearm, where the Dark Mark had been, even if Lucius had had any intention of doing so. It was healing and no longer painful, and would be as lasting as the lightning bolt on Potter's forehead.

Still clad in his trousers, Lucius straddled the boy's middle. Settling over Potter's groin, he could feel the outline of the boy's cock through the flimsy material of his trousers. Potter wasn't quite hard, but not disinterested either. Being forced to take Lucius' weight wouldn't help matters. Lucius could see the lines of strain in the thin face before his attention was drawn back to his nipples which still perked up after his earlier teasing. 

He brushed his thumbs over the little red nubs, noticing the way Potter's breath hitched for the shortest moment. Lucius let the corners of his mouth turn up in a knowing smile and repeated the touch more firmly. This time, Potter managed to keep his breathing even, although he glared death at his tormentor.

Lucius dipped his head and touched his tongue to one of them. Potter's skin was salty and damp, and quite pleasant, really. He rolled his tongue around the nipple a couple of times before drawing it into his mouth and sucking it gently. Potter's heartbeat hammered in flat beats under his skin. Lucius was close enough to hear it. He teased Potter to a near-squirming state, then bit down sharply. The boy let out a raw sound that crawled down Lucius' spine and curled around his balls. For a moment, he was tempted to conjure a pair of clamps to show Potter how much worse the bite could get. But he was supposed to subdue his victim by turning his body against him – outside stimuli might be counter-productive. 

Instead, he shifted his attention to Potter's other nipple and started to lavish it with attention, while squeezing the other between thumb and index finger, until both practically glowed. Potter fretted wordlessly, but Lucius took his sweet time before releasing him. He bent close. 

"Would you rather be kissed, little Harry?"

The boy's bottom lip was dented with bite marks. He didn't say anything, but his eyes were begging. Lucius smiled and leaned forward, capturing Potter's face between both hands. He claimed Potter's mouth with bruising force, overcoming the hesitant barrier of teeth with an admonishing press to the boy's temples. 

Potter's mouth tasted hot and a little sour with fear, but sent a shot of prickling excitement through Lucius when he managed to track down his tongue. He flattened himself atop Potter's body, feeling the angry heat of his nipples against his chest.

"Come, Potter," Lucius whispered. "We've both seen you do better than that." 

A flash of impotent anger bled from Potter's eyes. When he had composed himself, his mouth opened pliantly under Lucius' even as his eyelids closed as if to shut out the world. Around the fan of dark lashes, his skin looked so pale it was almost blue. 

Whatever the youngster was running on – sheer adrenaline, or the aftermath of the curse high – he might not last much longer. Certainly not as long as Lucius would have liked to play with him. Potter had been near death only days ago, he reminded himself. Healing charms, even strong ones, only went so far. 

He caught Potter’s swollen bottom lip between his teeth and bit down before taking control of his mouth again. This time, the boy participated in the kiss, meeting Lucius' demanding tongue with a gentle press of his own. It took away some of the force, but Lucius felt a rush of desire spike in his stomach and spread down to his cock. He thoroughly enjoyed the warmth of Potter's mouth and his response, running his tongue along Potter's and stroking the dark hair at the boy's temples between his thumbs and index fingers. 

When he lifted his mouth away from the boy's, it was with a sense of reluctance. His groin, still pressing heavily into Potter's, left no doubt about the pleasure he was taking. 

Lucius ran both hands along the sides of Potter's body, from chest to flank, before climbing off him at last. 

"Let's speed this up, shall we?" he asked, noting how the boy's fingers tightened around the latticework of the headboard he was clinging to. Lucius smiled. 

Kneeling between Potter's legs, Lucius took hold of his calves, feeling gooseflesh under his fingers. He folded back Potter's legs to expose his hole, greyish-pink and nervously puckered. A burst of wandless magic summoned one of the discarded pillows into his hand, and fluffed it. He pushed it under Potter's bottom to take the strain of the boy's back and give himself easier access. 

The skin between Potter's thighs and genitals was very soft, Lucius discovered when running his fingers along it. The boy shuddered under the touch and let out a strained sound of protest which ceased abruptly when Lucius reached for his wand. 

The Cleaning Charm Lucius sent over and through the lower half of the boy's body made Potter twitch, more from the foreshadowing of the violation to come than from discomfort, Lucius assumed, although he knew the spell stung quite a bit if used internally. 

Resuming his firm grip on Potter's calves and spreading them a bit further, he gave in to the desire of burying his face against the juncture. Potter's skin was damp and had a musky tang; his cock brushed the side of Lucius' face, warm and half-hard with unwelcome sensations. Lucius' braid twisted across the boy's groin like a silver snake. 

He pressed a kiss to the tempting skin and drew back, dragging his braid along the boy's length. Potter made a lovely mewling sound at that. 

"Soon," Lucius promised, and the mewl lowered to a growl.

Holding Potter's legs apart with one hand, he ran his fingers over the loose folds of the boy's scrotum, teasing each individual ball and rolling it in the palm of his hand. He could feel the nervous sweat breaking out under his fingers. 

After placing a light bite on the curve of Potter's arse, Lucius released his balls and moved down to stroke his perineum. This time, Potter squirmed and his breath grew laboured under the deft, torturously gentle treatment. Not a sensation he could possibly mistake for pain, Lucius thought smugly.

He kept it up until Potter gasped, then traced the edge of the nail over the boy’s hole, and watched his entire body freeze. The tendons on his upstretched arms stood out like roots from the strain. 

Lucius tsked and gave Potter a hard look. "Compliance, remember?"

The boy's face was dripping with sweat. "I can't-"

"Potter, your panic is premature," Lucius cut him off. "I'm not even inside you yet." He acknowledged the frantic widening of his prey's eyes. "You battled and killed the Dark Lord – surely this is mere discomfort in comparison?"

That shut Potter up, as Lucius had known it would. The boy's pride was his own worst enemy. His eyes sought refuge in some imaginary spot on the ceiling, although his body didn't relax.

With a final flick of his wand, Lucius summoned a bottle of cooking oil from the castle kitchens. Not quite the standard he was used to for sexual encounters, but he'd used up the limited stores of potions ingredients Tintagel's elves maintained for the Healing Potions that had reversed Potter's descent into death. He'd be damned if he spent more time in the dungeons brewing lubricant for the little pest. 

He uncorked the bottle and drizzled some oil onto his fingers. It smelled subtly of herbs. The elves were probably pressing it themselves, adding extra fragrance. It would do just fine. He coated his fingers and returned his attention to Potter's hole. It was still tightly furled, but with the oil, the tip of his finger slipped inside.

"If you'd relax, you stupid child, it'd hurt considerably less," Lucius responded matter-of-factly to Potter's grimace of revulsion. The boy's resistance didn't ease in the slightest.

Opening up Potter's resisting body took time and several returns to the oil bottle. Even around his index finger, Potter felt very warm and tight, promising Lucius' cock delights to come. Lucius shifted discreetly and returned to his task. A few suppressed moans of pain escaped the boy as he pushed forward, but Lucius ignored them. He'd warned Potter to relax. If he foolishly insisted on hurting himself out of pride, it was hardly Lucius' fault. He'd just have to pay the price.

Once he'd worked in the length of his index finger, Lucius paused to let Potter adjust and to admire the sight of Potter's reddened hole clenching around his finger. The boy's eyes were screwed tightly shut; his erection had wilted almost completely. 

Twisting his finger, he searched for the small nub that was Potter's prostate. But even when he felt it under his fingers and brushed over it carefully, it only produced a grimace. With a sigh, Lucius leaned over Potter's rear and hooked the index finger of his unoccupied hand around the base of the boy's cock to tilt it up. Then he closed his mouth around the tip. 

Potter's eyes snapped open; he gasped. Lucius gave him a sardonic smirk around his mouthful and ran his tongue along the tip to entice the glans out from the foreskin. He could see the boy biting down hard on his bottom lip to stifle another sound.

His finger still deep inside Potter's arse, Lucius slid his tongue over the boy's cock, sucking it experimentally. Potter tasted of salt and musk, but cleanly thanks to the earlier Scourgify. It wasn't an unpleasant task, and it was rewarded after a few moments by the slow, reluctant filling out of flesh against his tongue. 

He kept moving his fingertip inside the boy, brushing his prostate ever so often to achieve a degree of double stimulation that would push Potter away from pain and towards pleasure. 

The boy's responses told him quite a bit. Potter disliked even the lightest graze of teeth on his cock – he froze and stopped breathing when Lucius attempted it; however, being sucked nearly brought his hips off the bed, although he tried valiantly, to keep still. Firm pressure against his prostate did nothing for him; mere ghost-like brushes around it, on the other hand, made him squirm and his erection swell. 

Lucius smiled as he gave the boy's prick one last, languid lick before popping it out of his mouth. It continued to stand on its own, shyly curved and glistening with saliva. A dark blush had travelled up from Potter's collarbones into his cheeks, suffusing them with scarlet.

"I didn’t promise you only pain." Lucius met Potter's panicked eyes through his spread legs. Quite the opposite, he thought. The point wasn't to torture his victim into submission; it was to seduce him into surrendering to a superior will, and to anchor the curse in his body, mind and soul. Giving a bit of pleasure to a long-standing enemy was a small price to pay for such a victory. 

He pulled his finger slowly out of Potter. Aware of the ache in his own cock, Lucius contemplated Potter's hole while tapping his fingertips along the boy's length for distraction. Dark pink with strain and slick with oil, it gaped a little wider, if still not relaxed enough to make penetration painless. 

Then again, there was no reason for making things _too_ enjoyable for Potter, and Lucius' own erection was clamouring for attention. 

He opened the drawstrings of his trousers and slid them down over his hips - not trying to pose for Potter, but in no particular rush either. The soft fabric caught the head of his cock, raised in anticipation, before pooling around him. Lucius threw it to the foot end of the bed with a careless gesture, and turned back to Potter. 

He caught the boy staring. His knees had instinctively drawn closer together as soon as Lucius had moved out from between them. Although his expression said quite eloquently that he didn't enjoy looking at Lucius' arousal, he was obviously too fascinated – or horrified – to avert his eyes. Lucius favoured him with a smirk that was all teeth, and crept back onto the mattress. 

As if oblivious to the boy's stare, he returned to the bottle of oil and spilled a decent amount into his palm. With slow, appreciative strokes, he began to spread it over his cock. He enjoyed the sensation for a long moment, feeling the flesh harden under his fingers and Potter's terrified eyes. 

He spilled another drizzle into his hand, then levitated the bottle away and resumed his previous position between Potter's legs, pushing them apart with an admonishing headshake. Readjusting the pillow to prop Potter's arse up higher, he coated his fingers and pressed them against Potter's entrance. The boy's thighs trembled under his grip. Folded back as he was, Lucius could see the blue outline of a flesh-knitting charm running down the back of his thigh and into the hollow of his knee. Yes, that had been a rather bad one. 

When Potter's opening was glistening and trickles of oil started to run down his thighs, Lucius positioned himself and lined up the head of his cock with the gaping little hole. The first push, just enough to immerse the very tip, felt so good that pleasure fizzed though his blood as if trying to set it on fire. 

There was the temptation of shoving into the boy with as little preparation as he deserved, watching him writhe and claw at the bedposts, to see what manner of screams he could wring out of that bony little body. Lucius could picture Potter's pained contortions before his inner eye, and the image made his mouth go dry. 

He pushed forward in a jerky little shove that produced a gurgle from the boy's throat. Lucius forced himself to still. Surely it couldn't hurt that much – the boy was well-oiled and had been stretched; his prick was still quite hard. 

Lucius moved with determination but carefully enough, smoothed along by the liberal amounts of oil he'd applied. Even so, Potter was beautifully tight around him. The boy's inner walls squeezed the head of his cock in obstinate resistance, creating a hot pressure that curled heavily in Lucius' balls. 

The boy clung to the bars of the headboard for dear life, nails digging into the flesh of his palms to fight the ache he had to be feeling. His teeth were biting into his bottom lip hard enough to draw blood; Lucius wanted to lean forward and lick it off.

This time, Potter managed to suppress even the slight noises of pain that had escaped when Lucius had opened him. Now, he just suffered, face awash with sweat, as his body fought every step of the way. 

"Quite a painful thing, pride," Lucius commented off-handedly. "Isn't it, Potter?"

"I hate you!" Potter spat so venomously it might as well have been Parseltongue.

"I know, poor child," Lucius replied, burrowing a little deeper in a way that made Potter cringe and shut him up quite effectively. "It makes the feel of you even more delicious."

Relentlessly, Lucius pushed himself forward until he had eased himself in to the balls, biting his own lip to keep Potter’s squeezing channel from overcoming his self-control. 

He withdrew a little to allow Potter a harsh gasp of air, then pushed back in again, setting an uneven rhythm made awkward by the boy’s resistance. Grabbing Potter’s thighs in both hands, he folded him back further, taking control of every movement until he started to slide rapidly and hard into the boy’s hole, sweat and oil making the penetration easier. Potter’s chest heaved; his breaths were coming high and raspy. His cock, on the other hand, had barely flagged. 

For an instant, Lucius stopped moving. He let his eyes wander from Potter’s dark-red erection to his face with a suggestive expression. Under his piercing gaze, a trickle of white fluid pearled at the tip. Potter’s face wasn't pale any longer; it was almost as red as his cock. Lucius' tongue touched his bottom lip, and Potter’s eyes squeezed shut. 

It was amusing to see the boy so torn between trying to suppress pain and failing to feel pleasure, and the sheer confusion and self-disgust that twisted his emotions into a rough rope of contradiction. Potter wasn’t prepared for this – he’d had plenty of experience with pain, but none with what could happen when it triggered lust. 

Potter's reaction stoked the heat in Lucius' groin; he resumed his thrusts, sinking deep into the slick, reluctant flesh until his balls started to ache. The image of Potter's teeth drawing blood from his lower lip as he tried to stifle any sound of pain set his brain on fire.

When it struck, the pleasure was exquisite, shooting from Lucius' balls up his spine. He pushed into Potter one final time, and emptied himself deep inside him. The hot spill slickened Potter’s insides. Caught up in the surge of pleasure, Lucius closed his eyes and simply rode the wave of orgasm that shuddered through him. 

Potter wasn't the only one who needed to push away the memories of the recent days, although the boy couldn't be allowed to suspect. For a moment, Narcissa's face appeared before Lucius' inner eye, head cocked in a half-smile, and her hair piled on top of her head in the style that made her neck appear fragile and elegant and had never failed to arrest his breath. She raised an eyebrow at him in wry amusement, and Lucius had to shake the image off before the pain could show on his face.

He pulled out with a wet sound and performed a quick and dirty clean-up on the bedclothes. The house-elves would take care of it, and it wasn’t Lucius who would be sleeping here tonight. Only then did he release the boy’s thighs and noticed the circles of blackening bruises his fingers had left on the tender flesh. Well, in all likelihood Potter would read them as intentional brutality rather than suspecting that his enemy had got carried away blinded by desire.

He eyed the mess of semen that dribbled from Potter's stretched hole, trying to gauge the degree of humiliation he had inflicted. Then he wrapped his hand around Potter's engorged prick, spreading wetness over the slit with his thumb. 

Potter jerked as if Lucius had touched him with a hot iron.

"No!"

Lucius eyed him sharply, though inside, he breathed a sigh of relief. It had taken a long time for the boy to crack, caught up as he was in the trap Lucius had lured him into. Feverish with despair, Potter’s eyes burned into him. 

"What is it you need, boy?"

Even if Potter had been self-aware enough to understand that half of his request was 'to come', Lucius knew that he'd never hear it – not tonight.

Potter's hands came free of the head board he'd so far clung to obediently. His chest was still heaving, eyes bruised green slits of despair. He pushed at Lucius' shoulders. From the way his fingers twisted into claws, Lucius was half expecting him to dig them into the flesh of his face and try to tear it into bloody strips. Potter's entire, too-pale body was taut as a bowstring. 

"As I told you before we started – I can control your mind or master your body," Lucius pointed out. "Fighting will gain you nothing except pain."

Without warning, Potter lashed out with one fist. Lucius only just managed to catch it half an inch away from his nose. He slammed it down on the pillow next to Potter's head, then grabbed the other wrist and did the same. For a moment, Potter lay collapsed and trapped in a quivering heap, and Lucius wondered if he'd finally reached his breaking point.

Then he brought his knee up at a near-impossible angle, trying to stab it into Lucius' groin or stomach. Flattening himself atop the boy's body, Lucius used his weight to trap Potter's leg. The boy let out a groan of pain as his knee was bent and twisted. 

After pushing down hard for a moment to make his point, Lucius shifted his hip and allowed Potter to straighten. He did so with a grimace, and a smirk curled Lucius' mouth. Undoubtedly, being pushed down flat on his back on the bed hurt other tender body parts as well.

The boy's cock, squashed between their bodies, pressed warm into Lucius' hip. He shifted again to give it a provocative nudge. Potter's breath hitched. He tried to cringe, but had no room. 

In a burst of helpless rage, the boy fought against Lucius' death grip on his wrists. His body twisted like a snake's, and the friction was quite pleasant even against Lucius' spent cock. He could feel Potter's hardness pressing into him, secreting sticky wetness on Lucius' belly. 

The friction quietened Potter far more efficiently than Lucius' cruel hold. His face scrunched up, and Lucius wondered if he was going to cry. But the puffy, red slits the boy's eyes had turned into remained dry. His lips, however, moved in soundless protestations of "No, no, no…" Perhaps it was a prayer. 

Lucius leaned over him and ran his tongue along the shell of Potter's ear before tugging at the lobe with his teeth. 

"Yes," he whispered as the boy shuddered against him. "You might as well continue, poor thing." He lifted his hip and reached between their bodies to stroke Potter's swollen cock and revel in the anguished sound that escaped the boy. "We both know that willpower won't be getting rid of this tonight." He gave Potter's prick a squeeze for emphasis, knowing that he needed the boy reduced to pure instinct – fear of pain, fulfilment of his body's needs, beyond interference of that stubborn, rebellious mind.

"Come on, boy," he hissed. "You wanted a fight, now have it. Hurt me, if you can."

His face a grimace of despair, Potter twisted under his body, surging up to buck him off, but only succeeded in rubbing himself against Lucius' stomach in a way that was anything but innocent, all the way sobbing with shame and need.

"Is that the best you can do?" Lucius sneered. "I expected so much more from the man who destroyed Lord Voldemort twice."

Despite his challenging words, Lucius was utterly unprepared when the boy's head snapped around and his teeth closed around the tender inside of Lucius' upper arm. It wasn't a love bite either. Pain shot up Lucius' nerves. He jerked, trying to pull his flesh away from Potter's mouth, but the boy's teeth clamped down like a hunting Crup's, all satisfied rage. Lucius could feel his flesh give – it _hurt_! In an instinct-driven burst of wandless magic, Lucius bound Potter's wrists to the mattress, then dealt him a cruel blow to the side of his face that was not buried against his arm. Potter's head rocked to the side, and the grip of his teeth loosened a little. Gritting his own teeth, Lucius pulled free. A rivulet of blood trickled down his arm; the bite glared red against the pale skin. 

He paused for a moment, looking down at Potter's disappointed glare. The boy's cock was still digging into Lucius' hip, stiffer now if anything. With calm deliberation, Lucius backhanded the boy across the face hard enough to raise an imprint on his cheek, but without anger. 

"That was better," he acknowledged. 

Potter's cock jumped against his stomach, unexpected in its intensity. His back arched, pushing his body up against Lucius' as if he was suffering a seizure. His face pressed against Lucius' throat, mouth wet and open and without a trace of teeth.

The sound Potter made when he came was like the howl of an animal dying in pain; it sent a shiver down Lucius' back. Lucius could feel the fluid splash against his stomach, warm and sticky, intensifying the unmistakable smell of sex. 

Potter flopped back onto the mattress as if his bones had turned into liquid and lay there unmoving, his pulse hammering visibly under the skin at his throat.

For an instant, blue, white and pink embers crackled around Potter's wrists and throat, just as they had ringed him and Draco during the binding ritual. They didn't burn, but set Lucius' teeth on edge with fizzing energy when they touched his skin. Potter's eyes went wide and unfocussed. He didn't even twitch. Before his inner eye, Lucius could practically see the boy's stubborn will sink and curl itself around Draco's feet. 

Just slowly enough to avoid making it appear that he was fleeing Potter's proximity, Lucius pulled himself off the boy's body. As soon as their skin stopped touching, the restless energy receded. The embers faded, sinking right into Potter's flesh.

Lucius wiped the trickles of come off his stomach and thighs with a corner of crumpled bed sheet, regretting that the boy was too worn out to be made to lick them off him. A bath, later, he decided, would be preferable to a cleaning charm. Almost reluctantly, his eyes wandered back to Potter. 

The boy's face was thin and worn, so utterly exhausted as if the rest of the life that had animated him had spilled out along with his seed. Lucius brushed the boy's cheek with a finger to taste one of the tear tracks that glittered there. If he'd expected condensed grief, he was disappointed; it was as blandly salty as any tear ever shed.

Very gently, Lucius leaned forward to kiss the boy's forehead, right atop the black curse scar. "Thank you, child."

Potter’s face was smeared with sweat and tears, looking miserable and almost impossibly young. A trace of Lucius' blood still showed at his mouth. He was half-curled to the side, taking pressure off his abused arse, but Lucius thought he was too drained, mentally, physically and magically, to be able to feel much pain. Although his lids were drooping badly, he was still trying to keep up some sort of vigilance. 

"You got what you wanted, haven't you?" His voice was dry and cracked, but with exhaustion rather than emotion. "Can you leave me alone, now?"

"Soon," Lucius promised. He settled his hip on the bed and laid a hand over the reluctant eyes. After a moment, they closed under his palm. "Go to sleep, now." 

Potter relaxed almost instantly, exhaustion taking its toll. He was asleep so fast it was more like falling unconscious. After a minute, Lucius removed his hand, and reached for his wand. 

He’d bent Harry Potter to his will, mind and body, had peeled his soul right to the essence; now, what remained to be done was to ensure that the boy survived the experience.

_~ tbc. ~_


	4. Breaking

When Harry next opened his eyes, it was to the artificial dimness of daylight filtered out by curtains. A muted roar filled his ears, but it was strangely soothing and would not have roused him on its own. After a few moments, he realised it was the sea. The mournful cries of seagulls protesting the vagaries of fate were harder to shut out. 

He lay still. His body was slowly becoming aware of the bed sheets around him, inundated with his own warmth, of the duvet that covered him, its heavy red and black folds perfect for hiding bloodstains.

A torrent of nauseating images welled up in Harry's mind. He let out a croaky sob and curled into a ball. 

The sudden movement revealed a dull ache in his arse, a muscle spasm in his thighs that triggered more memories. Harry was painfully tempted to just bury himself under the covers and drift off again, but he didn't want Lucius Malfoy to come back and find him in his bed. Not again! The image of Malfoy's smug, satisfied face overlaid his inner eye. A sick sensation pooled in his stomach; he rubbed both fists over his face to make a few helpless tears disappear. Scrambling free of the bedding that still smelled of the bastard, he got to his feet. And nearly fell back as his legs gave out. It took a moment of careful balancing while clinging to the bedpost to regain his footing. 

There was a thin robe thrown over the foot of the bed, and Harry grabbed it with both hands. It had short, wide sleeves and reached only to his knees, with nothing but a belt to close it around his middle. While Harry was desperate for something to cover himself with, he'd have preferred to shower for a few hours before putting clothes on his soiled body. Now, however, he pulled the tunic over his shoulders and knotted the belt tightly around his waist. 

He hobbled over to the window. Both stone floor and walls were covered with tapestries and thick carpets that squished pleasantly under his bare toes. Harry climbed up onto the stone window seat, not unlike the ones in his dormitory at Hogwarts. He pulled back the drapes. 

And gasped. It was like looking directly out into the sea. Harry leaned forward to see more, and encountered an invisible barrier. The window had no glass pane – no glass in existence could be this transparent. It was magic that kept the wind out. He pushed against the magical barrier with his hand, but it was solid. 

The day wasn't bright. Only a few sunbeams tried to assert themselves through a sheet of clouds, and yet they somehow managed to imbue the water with a brilliant turquoise glow. Seagulls were wheeling in front of the window. To the left, he could make out a strip of coast line, of cliffs rising high above the white spray that fringed the deep green-blue of the sea like lace. Otherwise, there was nothing but water. 

Harry recalled that Malfoy had mentioned the Cornish coast. Aunt Petunia had once planned a summer holiday there for herself, Vernon and Dudley, which had fallen through because of Dudley's shrill protests against prospective walks and 'boring old ruins'. A few years later, the Dursleys had dragged him to a rock off the coast of Cornwall to escape his Hogwarts letters – in vain. Still, Harry remembered that Tintagel was a ruin – _this_ castle, while undeniably old, was anything but. 

Just then a *pop* sounded behind him. Harry whipped around so quickly he nearly fell off the window seat. On the hearth rug stood a stout house-elf in what looked like a jute sack. A piece of string belted it around his middle.

The house-elf eyed him sharply. "The boy has slept three nights – it is time that it wakes."

Harry's mouth gaped. He was aware that he hurt less than was warranted after his experiences with Lucius Malfoy, but he'd not expected to be given so much time to recover. Then again, he'd practically come apart in Malfoy's hands – he must have been utterly drained on top of having been cursed.

"Gorm has been sent to draw Lord Malfoy's boy a bath," the elf announced in a gravelly voice. 

Rage shivered through Harry's gut. "I am _not_ Malfoy's boy," he hissed. 

The elf eyed him sternly. "The boy has been bound to young Master Malfoy," he announced. "Lord Malfoy has taken it into his care. It should be honoured."

Harry fought down his anger. There was no point in railing at the elf – he was as trapped as Harry was.

"I'd like a bath," he said. "And my clothes."

"Lord Malfoy ordered them destroyed," the elf announced. "The boy received a robe - it should be grateful."

Harry could feel his cheeks heat. The robe was a flimsy thing, unsuited to the outdoors, and he didn't even have underwear, for God's sake! But then he already knew that it wasn't enough for Lucius Malfoy to violate his body – he revelled in Harry's humiliation too. 

Giving Harry no time to protest, the house-elf marched past him to touch the green-golden tapestry opposite the fireplace. It swung aside, revealing the door to a bath. Harry took in a wooden loo and marble sink, but it was the round bathtub of pink marble shot through with black that grabbed his attention. 

Gorm snapped his fingers, and water started to gush up from a near-invisible hollow along the bottom. The house-elf executed a complicated hand gesture. The water started to steam and emit a fresh scent of pine-needles. When the tub was two thirds filled, the creature closed his spindly fingers to a fist over the water, and the flow stopped. Ears drooping with exhaustion, Gorm announced: "Lord Malfoy's boy will bathe!" before vanishing with the customary *pop*.

Harry examined the bathroom door and hesitated. There wasn't even a door handle; if it could be locked at all, it would have to be with magic, and Harry's wand had been broken and lost in the hall of the Riddle House that had seen Voldemort's last stand. Still, the prospect of a bath was too much of a temptation. 

He stripped off the tunic and dipped his toes into the water. It was on the hot side of comfortable, but the heat was just what he needed. With his back to the wall and eyes on the door, he slid into the steaming warmth. Tears welled in his eyes as his skin turned red. He hissed, then grabbed the sponge that lay on the rim of the tub. He scrubbed himself over and over until water lapped over the rim and his skin burned and glowed lobster-red everywhere Lucius had touched him. There was little bruising left from the night Lucius had raped him. Even the deep blue reminders of heavy-duty post-battle healing charms had faded a little. Three days indeed.

Although Harry knew he'd been violated, he didn't allow himself to dwell on it. If he did, he'd be sick. Still, he felt a bit like a stranger inside his own skin. _Something_ about Malfoy's binding ritual might have been shielding him from the full impact of the experience. 

He stayed in the tub until the water started to cool, then reluctantly climbed out and helped himself to one of the fluffy white towels that hung beside the tub. He rubbed himself dry, then pulled the robe back over his still-damp body before using the toilet. The window above it was magically barred like the one in the bedroom. A glimpse into the mirror showed that his damp fringe was curling around his forehead, almost covering his scar. He looked pale and harrowed, but no longer like an exhausted wreck. 

When he made his way back into the bedroom, he found himself alone again. The bed sheets had been exchanged for crisp new ones, the bed made to precision. He discovered another black garment hanging over the back of a chair, and went over to shake it out. It was a pair of loose trousers made from the same thin material as his tunic, and resembled the pair Lucius had taken off to rape him. Still, he spared Gorm the house-elf a grateful thought as he pulled it on. 

He also found a plate with two slices of thick brown bread, butter and hard cheese on the desk beside a mug of cocoa. His stomach growled at the sight, making him aware that he hadn't eaten for days. For a second, he swayed at the smell of warm bread and had to grab the side of the desk for support. Hesitation lasted barely a second – Lucius had whatever he could possibly want from him. There was no point in resorting to poison. He wolfed the food down in no time, attending to every crumb on the plate, and emptied the mug to the dregs. 

Then he tried the door, not expecting it to budge. Contrary to his expectations, it swung open easily. Leaving the carpeted room and putting his bare feet on the icy flagstones made Harry flinch, but the urge to escape the oppressive presence of the bed was too great. He closed the door silently, and padded down the corridor. 

He passed two more heavy wooden doors before reaching a spiral staircase. There were no windows in the corridor, only two torches burning with green, sorcerous light. The staircase was narrow; Harry could only faintly remember it from when Lucius had dragged him up three nights ago – he'd been in too bad a shape. Halfway down, daylight fell in through a narrow crenel that emphasised the sheer thickness of the walls. Harry tried to peer out, but could only see sky. 

After more turns than he dared count, the staircase spat him out into a short corridor that led into a wood-floored gallery. Harry peered over the balustrade; his eye was caught immediately by the frosty flash of Lucius Malfoy's braid. He recoiled. Malfoy sat in one of the armchairs in the downstairs fireplace lounge, in quiet conversation with Walden Macnair. Acoustics or magic prevented Harry from eavesdropping – all he could hear was a soft, indistinct murmur. He turned and tiptoed away from the balustrade, grateful for the first time that he was barefoot. The wood barely creaked under his soles. He fled back into the corridor, driven by the desire not to draw Lucius' attention again for any reason. 

Searching for a way down was harder than Harry had expected. While Tintagel Castle differed from Hogwarts in lacking moving staircases, it was just as troublesome to navigate. Contrary to Hogwarts' wide corridors, large stained-glass windows and generous columned halls, here the heavy stone walls, age-darkened wood and smatterings of torches made the corridors seem to loom inwards. Windows were rare, often mere arrow slits that looked out on the sky and sea. It wasn't claustrophobic, not really – it just felt that way. 

Rounding another few corners, Harry finally reached a window slit that didn't show only water. Instead, it opened into a walled-in courtyard with a drawbridge that bridged the sharp drop between the wizarding island and the peninsula that hosted the scattered ruins of the Muggle castle. Both small islands were strung together and lay off the mainland, connected only by low stone cliffs that – at high tide- waves crested over. The drawbridge was down, and Harry's heartbeat sped up at the sight. From the back wall of the courtyard, a wooden door lead into a walled-in, wind-tossed garden that spread towards the cliffs. 

With fresh determination, Harry sought a downstairs staircase. He encountered neither wizard nor house-elf as he squeezed down the winding stairs in yet another corner tower, which was just fine with him. 

Reaching ground level at last, the corridor broadened into a long passage with arched windows behind substantial window seats. The walls were still half a metre thick, but the light coming in made them less oppressive. Harry slid into one of the seats and stared outside. The courtyard outside was cobble-stoned with no weed in sight, and the open drawbridge mesmerised Harry's attention. It was flanked by two lower stone buildings. 

Just as he watched, the door to the left-hand side building opened and a robed figure stepped out, followed by another. Harry didn't recognise either of them. They didn't look like Death Eaters, or rather, they didn't sport black robes and masks. One was a grizzled wizard in leathers; a short grey-blond braid hung down his back that left Harry with a sickening flashback of Lucius Malfoy's bed. The other was a young woman in pinstripe robes. A witch's hat sat jauntily on the back of her head. They were in deep conversation, not once glancing in Harry's direction. Instead, they passed the drawbridge and disappeared again into the building to the right. Even after they had gone, Harry couldn't stop staring. He stood there with both palms flat on the stone of the window seat, his nose almost touching the magical barrier that passed for a window pane. If there were other wizards in the area, apart from Malfoy and his Death Eater gang...

"You," a voice growled behind him. Harry whirled round, his hand reflexively reaching for the wand he no longer had. 

It was Vincent Crabbe, less bulky perhaps than he had been at school, but with longer, shaggier hair. Harry had been absently aware that Crabbe – along with Marcus Flint, the former Slytherin Quidditch captain who'd left Hogwarts a few years ago – had been among the fugitive Death Eaters, but hadn't spared him a thought. It was eerie to see him on his own – he and Goyle had always hung out together, mostly at Draco Malfoy's back.

"What are you doing here?" Crabbe snarled. 

Harry closed nervous fingers around the edge of the window sill he was backed up against. Crabbe already had his wand out, and was coming closer. Somehow, 'my door was open' didn't appeal as a response. 

Crabbe followed his glance out of the window, and a malicious smile lit up his ugly face. 

"I know what you're thinking, Potter," he said. "Forget it. This may be the Cornish Dragon Sentry Obliviators' headquarters, but they can't see you. Mr Malfoy has protected us with Fidelius, and there are Repellent spells all over the place. There's no escape for you." He sneered. "Even if there was, Draco wouldn't let you." 

Harry's stomach flipped at the mention of the name. He hadn't had much time or inclination to ponder the Redimio Cordis curse, and the only effect he'd felt so far was that even thinking of Draco Malfoy made him want to curl up inside.

Before he could say anything, Crabbe was thrusting his wand at his throat. 

"You shouldn't be here, Potter," he rasped with glittering eyes that didn't appear quite sane. "You shouldn't be _alive_."

Harry's mouth thinned. He gripped the window sill more tightly. Crabbe and Goyle had never displayed much magical skill at Hogwarts. But they had become Death Eaters, and it took mostly rage to cast the Killing Curse. Rage that Crabbe seemed to have in spades.

"Well, I am," he snapped. 

He was prepared for a curse, keeping wary eyes on the wand tip digging into the skin of his throat. He wasn't expecting Crabbe to slug him. The blow caught him across the mouth, and he could feel his lip split over his front teeth. The force slammed him backwards against the stone, and for a moment stars danced in front of his eyes. He could practically feel the bump forming at the back of his head. 

"It's all your fault!" he heard Crabbe growl at him as if through thick fog. "Everybody's dead, because of you!"

Harry shook his head, both in denial and to clear his addled mind. The movement sent another burst of pain through his skull. Harry wasn't used to brawling. As a child, he'd just run away and hid from Dudley and his goons, and later, fights were mostly waged with magic. He'd jumped Malfoy once, on the Quidditch pitch, he remembered, and for some reason, an aching surge of revulsion ran through him at the thought. Now, he had no magic, and running or hitting back wouldn't do him any good against Crabbe's wand.

He rubbed the back of his hand over his smarting lip and came away with a smear of blood. 

"Mr Malfoy spent all his power on healing you and barely bothered to _look_ at Mr Goyle," Crabbe accused him. "And now he's turned you into his little pet slut…"

Crabbe's ugly face twisted in disgust, and fury that left him shaking welled up from a place deep inside Harry. Perhaps Crabbe saw it creeping into his expression because, wand or not, he took a step back. 

"Would you like to switch places with me?"

Crabbe cocked his head and grunted. "You deserve it, Potter." He didn't meet Harry's eyes, though. "You're still alive, and everybody's still obsessed with you. But they didn't even really notice that my father and Greg are dead."

Harry closed his eyes for a moment against a pinching ache in his forehead that didn't have anything to do with the bruise. His rage evaporated. 

"I didn't want _anyone_ to die," he said, trying to get through Crabbe's thick skull. "Not your dad or Goyle or Mrs Malfoy. Not my parents and my godfather and Headmaster Dumbledore either." He rubbed the root of his nose, his gaze wandering between Crabbe's wand tip and his small, beady eyes. "I didn't want to fight Voldemort." He hesitated and swallowed drily as Crabbe flinched at the name. "I had no _choice_. I'm sorry they died."

Crabbe clenched his large fists and glared. Harry fell into a defensive stance, ready to duck, when the larger boy spat on the floor and muttered "Damn you!" He muscled past Harry, deliberately knocking into him hard enough with his shoulder to make him stumble into the window seat. 

Crabbe stormed off, and even after he'd disappeared around the corner, his angry footsteps still echoed on the stone floor. Harry waited until the steps died away in the distance, then followed. 

He'd seen a glimpse of the entrance portal that lead into the castle from the window, right opposite the drawbridge: a massive double door atop two flat stone steps. He wasn't going to take Crabbe's claim of 'no escape' at face value. 

It wasn't hard to find. Harry followed the corridor as it turned right, and after another few dozen steps reached what he took to be the castle's entrance hall. An elegant, stone-carved flight of stairs led upwards opposite the portal; two more corridors wound off to the left and right of it, while another, parallel to the one Harry had come through, ran along the courtyard wall to the East Wing. 

Harry turned to study the portal. It was made from the same ancient, dark wood as all the doors he'd passed so far, only heavier. He could see no lock, only a massive silver bar cast in the shape of a snake. He hesitated. The serpent didn't appear very life-like, but the place had once belonged to the Malfoys.

He reached out to lift it, or tried to. The metal, cold at the initial touch, seemed to heat and prickle under his fingertips, and the sensation shot right up his nerves and into his brain. He wasn't thrown back – it was more that when he came back to himself, he was trembling against the opposite corridor wall with a head that felt like it was filled with warm, sticky cobwebs. Part of him wanted to give it another try; a larger part was adamant that he'd never touch that door again. 

Without consciously deciding to, he followed the corridor past the staircase, leaving the portal behind him. The first couple of doors he passed were locked, but then there was one that stood ajar. Harry peered around the doorjamb, then ducked back.

It was a smallish sitting room with huge glass windows and a terrace door leading out into the gardens. Draco Malfoy sat on a couch, feet tucked under with a large, leather-bound tome in his lap. Not someone Harry wanted to encounter. He took a step back. 

"Come in, Potter, and close the door."

The ferret hadn't been looking in his direction, and hadn't even lifted his head. Harry gritted his teeth and stepped over the threshold. 

Now he could see that Crabbe was also present, standing beside the cheerfully blazing fireplace and glowering at him. Instinctively, Harry licked his bruised lip. 

"Vince was telling me that he saw you skulking around outside." At last, Malfoy put the book down on a side table. 

Life had obviously returned to the ferret during the three days Harry had been sleeping. He was still pale, with an even pointier chin than usual, but the ghastly indifference was gone from his face, replaced by the far more familiar expression of alert malice. 

Harry still found it hard to look at him. The memories they'd shared of Narcissa Malfoy's death couldn't have faded yet, and he didn't want to risk that sort of forced intimacy again. Now that he was actually standing before Malfoy, he could feel his presence like an itch at the back of his brain. Draco was carefully trying to project distance, but Harry sensed the insecurity that was bubbling underneath. Insecurity and anger.

"I think calling him here worked pretty well, don't you agree?" Malfoy asked Crabbe, who grunted as if he'd be just as happy if Harry had been struck by lightning on the way.

"I wasn't _called_ anywhere," Harry protested. He'd just… paid no attention to where he was going after the hex on the portal had half-scrambled his head.

"Of course you were." A ray of malevolent pleasure lit up Malfoy's triangular face. "After all, you belong to me now."

For some reason, Harry's heated objection was left stuck on his tongue. He settled for a disgusted glare.

"Tell me, Potter," Malfoy leaned back, propping his elbows on the back of the couch. "Did you enjoy playing the whore for my father?"

Harry went cold. Every bit of warmth seemed to flow out of his hands and feet and face until all he could feel was a jagged splinter of ice in his stomach.

"You think I enjoyed it?" he ground out.

"Oh, I am told that you were quite responsive." The bastard glanced up at Harry from under lazy, half-closed lids. The ache in Harry's stomach turned to a sick tingle. It was bad enough that Draco _knew_. But how could Lucius ever discuss what he'd done to Harry with his own _son_? "Now, I'm aware that it should have been my privilege to take you, but I think the spell was completed well enough regardless." 

Harry's fists clenched. His face flooded with heat although he wanted desperately to keep from flushing. Malfoy would see it and know he'd scored a blow. He saw Crabbe pushing away from the fireplace and taking a step in his direction, face grim, but Malfoy stopped him with a casual gesture.

"Don't worry, Vince – he won't hurt me." A quick glance revealed doubtful creases on Crabbe's forehead, but he stopped and leaned back against the mantelpiece. "He can't."

"I wouldn't bet on it," Harry said darkly. 

"Oh, but I would. I did some research, you know?" Malfoy nodded at the heavy black tome he'd put down on the table. "Though it's a pretty old and rare spell from the prime days of pureblood society, so there's not too much detail to go on. We'll have to find out for ourselves, I guess." His grin was full of teeth. "You're compelled to protect me, Potter. So you can stop pretending you'd be able to do me damage." 

Although Harry wanted very much to erase that grin from Malfoy's face with his fists, he felt no shred of compulsion to actually do so despite his rage. It wasn't that the idea of hitting Draco Malfoy hurt, or anything like that. It was quite tempting in theory – just not in practice.

His mouth thinned. Malfoy, watching him, looked cheerful. 

"Come on, Potter, aren't you curious how it works?"

"No," Harry snarled. It wasn't quite true; he wanted to know, if only to know what to prepare for, and how to fight it.

"Liar."

"Well, tell me, then," Harry shot back, suddenly tired of mincing words with the ferret. 

"Mmh." Leaning forward, Malfoy took the book from the table. From up close, Harry could see that the cover was made from stiff, veined leather, with copper corners that appeared extremely sharp. Malfoy was careful not to touch them when he lifted it. Then, with a faint grimace of distaste, he raised his hand and dragged his palm over one of them. 

Blood welled up around the metal, staining the dark leather cover, and the pain hit Harry as if he had cut himself. Shock and surprise mingled in his harsh cry; he forced his fist to open, only to find it unmarked. It _hurt_ , though. 

Swearing, he jumped forward. He pried Malfoy's hand away from the book and turned it over. The cut was deep, and the Slytherin was staring down at it with a distant expression that reminded Harry of three days back. He wanted to slap it off Draco's face. Instead, he went for the sheath at Malfoy's belt and pulled out his wand. It was made from light wood with a reddish tinge and a surprisingly simple braided leather handle. Not the one he'd seen Malfoy use throughout his school years. Perhaps his, like Harry's, had not survived the battle. 

Still holding Draco's wrist, Harry tried to recollect the exact words of the spell that would stop the bleeding, then barked it out with a wavy wand flick. He wasn't prepared for the black fog that suddenly rose in front of his eyes. His stomach lurched and his knees were turning to treacle. He had to lean on the armrest of the couch in order not to fall over. 

"You're out of energy," Draco's voice drifted down to him, sounding like it was coming from miles away. The wand was being pulled from his grip, gently. "Don't use magic again – it might kill you."

"Well, why did you do that to yourself, then?" Harry snapped back, trying to regain his balance. "Considering that I get to feel it too, can you keep a lid on future impulses for self-mutilation?"

A thin smile ghosted over Malfoy's lips as he stared down at his bloody palm, still cradled in Harry's hand. 

"Want to kiss it better, Potter?" Harry's stomach gave another lurch. He dropped Malfoy's fingers quickly, but perhaps not quickly enough because he could _see_ himself touching the tip of his tongue to the blood, lapping delicately to clean the skin around the wound... He wiped his fingers on his robe and took a step back, pushing the thought out of his mind.

Only now did he become aware that a wand tip was pressing against the back of his neck. Harry stood very still. After a long moment it vanished, and he heard Crabbe step aside. When the large boy did flick his wand, a stream of ragged gauze spilled from it. Malfoy pointed his chin at Harry, and Crabbe stuffed the flimsy material into Harry's hands. With a mutinous expression, Harry tore off a strip to clean the blood from Malfoy's palm. 

For a split instant their eyes met, and Harry's ears started to burn red. He knew that they'd both been picturing exactly the same image. 

Once it was reasonably clean, Harry tore off another strip to fold over the cut, then wrapped the rest of the bandage around Malfoy's hand. It was more slender than his father's, Harry noted. Less powerful. He wouldn't have as hard a grip. Then again, he probably wouldn't need to. 

One corner of Malfoy's mouth lifted up. 

"Well done. You _could_ do something to make it better, though." He placed his undamaged hand in his lap with a rather expressive gesture, and pressed down lightly on his groin. 

The heat in Harry's face intensified, and the sick tingle in his stomach returned. 

"I think it would only be fair," Malfoy pointed out. "My father had you in my stead, so I think I deserve a taste as well."

"What is _wrong_ with you people?" Harry exploded. "You, your father... are all Death Eaters this perverted, or is it just the Malfoys?"

"Only with those who keep crossing us, Potter." Malfoy cocked his head. "And you've been very good at that, haven't you? Now let's see what else you're good at." 

"You can't make me!" Harry said. He met Malfoy's eyes, hard. This wasn't Lucius, and this time, he wasn't half dead from having his will eroded. 

"I can't order you," Malfoy conceded. "But that doesn't mean I can't make you."

It was now, staring into his enemy's face, that Harry understood. The sick fluttering sensation he'd been experiencing hadn't come from himself, but from Malfoy, spilling over into his own mind. Physical desire, not for Harry, but to have Harry submitting to him, to feel the distraction of a warm mouth around his cock. To forget. 

So far, Malfoy had clung to his self-control, only letting through some small, specific things, like wanting Harry to come to him. Now, Harry felt the brittleness in that shield, and he'd seen enough through Malfoy's eyes during the ritual to know the abyss that had to yawn beneath. 

The mask of cheerful evil Malfoy had shown him wasn't a lie – he did have a score to settle with Harry for seven years' school rivalry. He _wanted_ to project strength and control to his fellow fugitives, to erase the memory of the near-catatonic child he'd become at a time of crisis. So unlike his father, the fighter. But underneath the mask squirmed a mass of despair and loss and fear, not the least of it dread of that strange, unasked-for bond that now connected him to Harry. 

Harry felt the emotions spilling into him like a knot of serpents. Tears that Draco wouldn't – _couldn't_ – shed pricked his own eyes. As much as he hated himself for it, he _understood_ why conjuring desire would uphold both Draco's mask and allow him to forget for some precious moments. Draco's hand, pressing against his cock and producing a delightful surge of desire, sent a spark of answering heat through Harry. He cursed soundlessly.

"Get on your knees," Malfoy commanded, very softly. Harry bit his lip hard, but finally obeyed. He didn't quite want to look at Malfoy, but didn't want to look away either. The sitting area was grouped atop a plush carpet, so kneeling wasn't painful. Harry finally settled for staring at the white gauze bandaging Malfoy's right hand. 

Malfoy sat back more comfortably and spread his legs to accommodate Harry between them. Then he lifted his hand away and made an inviting gesture. His robe gaped open at the front, revealing a soft grey shirt and matching trousers. 

Reluctantly, Harry's hand wandered to the trouser buttons. He felt... hollow inside. The need of Draco's cock to be touched pounded through him. There were three buttons, smooth polished horn that slipped too easily through the button holes under Harry's fingertips. He pushed the flaps aside, revealing soft silk underpants and wanted nothing so much as to tear himself away, bury his head into the couch's upholstery and cry. Instead, he hesitated with his hand palm-up in the air while Malfoy tilted his head curiously. Then he laid it against the bulge of Malfoy's cock just as Malfoy's own hand had been, pressing down lightly. Malfoy let out a soft hiss of approval. He reached out and touched Harry's face, cupping his cheek. 

"Suck me off, Potter?"

It was the question mark at the end that broke Harry's defences. He grasped for Malfoy's cock, fumbling at the underwear only to discover that it parted without effort under his fingers. Magical inseam – Harry almost dissolved into hysterical laughter. Inside its silken nest, Malfoy's cock was hot and damp. Harry swallowed a gasp when he closed his hand around it and felt the touch through the bond that connected them, as though he'd been touching himself. Malfoy was aroused already. Harry pulled the warm length up and towards him, and hesitated. It curved pink and heavy in his hand, and he had no idea whatsoever what to do with it. For a second, the memory of Lucius' mouth around him flashed before his inner eye. Harry shivered and almost dropped Draco's cock, wondering if he was going to be sick. 

"Come on, Potter," Malfoy rasped over his bowed head. "Please?" 

Harry's fingers closed tightly around the ferret's cock in a sudden burst of anger. He could feel Malfoy experimenting with the Redimio Cordis curse, trying to hit on the triggers that would compel Harry to do what he wanted. He wasn't even above begging, the bastard! Or trying to sound as if he was. Harry just hoped that Crabbe was too thick to get it, and that it would destroy some of his high opinion of his ringleader. 

Cursing inwardly, Harry lowered his head and traced his lips over Malfoy's prick. It jumped a little when he touched the head, already peeking out from the foreskin and with a drop of moisture at the tip. Without thinking, Harry licked it off. A bit salty, and not too pleasant, but not as disgusting as the taste of the haggis the house-elves had served at Hogwarts. He didn't need to look up to know that Malfoy's mouth had opened slightly.

Gathering his courage, Harry closed his lips around the head of Malfoy's cock. He touched his tongue to the slit, and tasted another trickle of fluid. There was the slight ridge where the foreskin gave way to the head, and Malfoy's legs parted a little wider when Harry probed it with his tongue. The head tasted different, somehow more intense, fleshy and musky. It was smoother than the rest, too, he realised as he ran his mouth a bit further down. Below the tip, the skin was rougher, and he could feel a vein under his tongue. 

"Go on," he heard Malfoy whisper above him, in a strangely rough voice. The urgency of it crept right up Harry's spine.

Experimentally, he gave the tip a little suck. Malfoy gasped and moved his hips upward, wordlessly urging Harry to take him deeper. 

Harry did, sliding his lips down the fattening length and exploring the vein he'd noticed before. When he'd taken in as much as he comfortably could, he sucked again. The wet slurp of it made his cheeks burn in shame, buried as they were between Malfoy's thighs. 

Malfoy's hands slipped into his hair, treading through the already messy strands. In any other situation, it might have been comforting. When the grip tightened to force Harry to take him deeper, and the head of Malfoy's cock pressed against the back of his throat, Harry growled. Malfoy shivered as the sound travelled up his length. 

"Impressive, Potter," he gasped. "You sound like a kitten."

Mortified, Harry grazed him lightly with his eye tooth. He knew from personal experience with Lucius that it wasn't painful, just really unpleasant. He could _feel_ the sensation traveling from Malfoy's cock into his spine, and wasn't prepared for the spike of arousal that echoed through Malfoy and back into him. His cock strained against the front of his trousers.

Malfoy stopped pushing, however, seemingly content to let Harry set his own awkward pace. Harry slowly slid his lips down Malfoy's erection, sucking at the head, then trailed back down to take in most of Malfoy's length until he could feel the warmth of Malfoy's balls at his chin. If it was almost pleasant, it wasn't because Harry enjoyed it; it was because Draco did. 

Malfoy's reactions guided him: his breaths were becoming more irregular, the restless movement of his hips under Harry's hands, the low groans that escaped him when Harry's tongue did something particularly effective. At the same time, Malfoy's growing excitement simmered in Harry's own blood, provoking a matching response in his groin.   
Feeling his knees beginning to ache, Harry braced himself on Malfoy’s thigh with one hand, and wrapped the fingers of his other around the base of Malfoy’s cock to keep it steady. Again, Malfoy’s hands tightened in his hair. He leaned forward until his forehead almost touched the top of Harry’s head. To Harry, it felt like a circuit was being closed. They suddenly seemed to be utterly alone in the world, a ring of flesh and need that pulsed under his tongue and in his groin and shut out everything that was outside, turning them into a single unit.

“Yes,” Draco whispered. Harry was enveloped by the need of him; Draco's scent, wooden and strong and sweaty, was rising up from his groin. His cock twitched deep in Harry’s mouth. On instinct, Harry swallowed and pressed his tongue against it, hard.

He could feel Draco’s hips rise, pushing his prick deep into Harry's mouth; a sharp sound escaped him as he spilled himself into Harry’s throat. Reflexively, Harry swallowed. The taste of Draco hit his tongue, bland with a faint, salty tang that Harry thought he might never entirely be rid of.

The heat rush caught Harry unawares; a spark shot from Draco into him, setting his already aching prick on fire. He felt himself pulsing in the confines of his trousers, a sticky mess soiling the thin fabric. Fire of pure mortification shot into his cheeks.

Draco’s hands held him down for another long moment, as if he had forgotten how to unclench his fingers. He was still shuddering.

When he finally straightened and released his grip, it was as if an invisible curtain was falling between them. Draco’s mind closed off like a tortoise that was retracting its head back into its shell. A feeling of surprised disgust tickled the back of Harry’s brain.

Flinching away from Malfoy's spent cock that rested against his thigh like a sleeping snake, Harry wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. 

"You did a pretty good job there, Potter," Malfoy drawled, flicking a lazy glance up at Harry. "Did my father teach you how to suck cock, or are you just naturally gifted?"

Harry's intestines cramped, and for a second, he thought he was going to throw up the come he'd swallowed. He felt like crying, but he'd rather die than show Malfoy more weakness than he already had. 

"Has your father taught you to be a sick and despicable little bastard, or is it a family gift?" he snarled back. Malfoy's expression didn't change, but his fury hit Harry like a slap in the face. He gritted his teeth and glared as Malfoy's eyes travelled to his groin. The tunic hid the wet spot, but there was no way the bastard could have overlooked his reaction. 

"So you _do_ get off on pleasuring despicable bastards, Potter?" he sneered. "If I'd known that, we could have had a lot more fun at school."

"Fuck you, Malfoy." Harry's voice was dry like the snap of a dead branch. He whipped round and blindly made for the nearest door, a real glass pane leading out onto a terrace and the gardens. 

He heard Crabbe move before he saw him, and whirled around as if he could force the other boy out of his way through sheer force of will. But Crabbe didn't quite meet his eyes. Instead, he stopped and seemed to study the floor. Harry brushed past him and fled outside. 

The balcony door let out onto a terrace, then down a garden path. The sea wind tore at Harry's hair and at the thin material of his clothes, emphasising the cold damp spot at his groin. The smooth stones of the path were cold under Harry's feet although the day was bright with afternoon sunshine. Despite the cold, being outside and away from the stifling corridors of the castle and its repulsive inhabitants felt wonderful. Harry sucked in deep lungfuls of air. 

He wiped his mouth on the sleeve of his robe several times, but could still taste Malfoy's come, smell his scent all over him. The memory of Malfoy's presence in his mind was still there, like an oozing trail of slugs, but it didn't pull at him now. Certainly Malfoy had got what he wanted, and just like his rapist father was probably busy gloating smugly over his victory and Harry's humiliation. 

The path was lined with a bed of hardy flowers that appeared as weather-beaten as the bushes that sheltered the terrace from view. Behind them, grassy knolls led down to the cliffs, falling down several dozen feet into the sea. A hedge ringed the cliffs, and even from the distance Harry could see that the interwoven, thorny branches had to have been grown magically – the complex shapes were beyond nature. 

The path ended in the wooden door leading out into the courtyard that Harry had seen from the tower window. It, too, was shut with a silver bar in the shape of a snake, and Harry knew better than to try and touch it. He had to stand on tiptoe to peer over the gate. Wistfully, he stared at the buildings beside the drawbridge, hoping he'd get another glimpse of the Obliviators. Maybe he could shout, or wave, to attract their attention somehow, even if he couldn't get out. But the courtyard remained empty.

"Ah – it's little baby Potter, searching for an escape."

Harry whirled around so fast it almost gave him whiplash. The voice was unmistakable; the face, even more so. 

Bellatrix Lestrange stood behind him, looking very much like she had when she'd helped Lucius put the binding curse on him – sweeping red dress, boots, unkempt hair, and mad eyes. She'd put one hand on her hip; the other held her wand in an expansive gesture. 

"Little sleekit Potter, slipped away from his Masters." She licked a crimson bottom lip. "As Bella knew he would." She nodded at the courtyard. "Were you hoping for the nice Ministry wizards to swoop in and rescue you?" She threw her head back with laughter. "They're only interested in dragons, not mangy lion cubs. But Bella is. Bella looked out for you."

She flicked her wand. The spell tore across Harry's chest like a whip, turning the front of his tunic into smoking tatters. He flew backwards into the flower bed, blinded with pain and scrambling to get back on his knees. 

He'd only managed to prop himself up on one arm when the curse hit. 

" _Crucio!_ "

Pain sliced into Harry as if a torch had ignited his blood. He screamed and fell back into the dirt, trying to crawl backwards, away from the source of agony. Bellatrix's form wavered in front of him, washed out by the tears that streamed from his eyes. He didn't want to give her the satisfaction of seeing him cry; he just couldn't help it. 

When the curse was lifted, he found himself lying with his cheek half pressed into the scratchy leafs of a flower. He looked up, right at Bellatrix's wand. The skin on his neck tightened in fear. 

"You shouldn't cry so loud, little dirtblood baby," she sing-songed. "You don't want Lucius to come for you again, do you?" She leered at his middle, as if she could see the stain of come there. "Now be quiet and take your punishment like a good boy. _Silencio_!" 

Harry's hand flew to his throat. He couldn't feel anything, but...

Bellatrix winked at him and blew him a kiss. Then her wand stabbed forward. 

" _Crucio!_ "

The curse cut into him with full force. An invisible knife was peeling the flesh from his bones; he was being thrown into fire, his bones burned clean in a bath of acid. His mouth opened in an agonised scream, but no sound came out. He writhed on the ground in a feeble attempt to escape. But there was no hope. Spikes were hammered into every cell of his body, splitting them asunder until they started to drift apart, and his mind along with them…

" _Ennervate!_ "

Every fragment of his mind and body rebelled against being dragged back to consciousness. His muscles trembled uncontrollably, and he thought he’d probably be sick if the prospect of convulsing didn't promise sheer agony. Even breathing hurt. 

“Not so heroic, are you now, Potter?” Bellatrix sneered down at him. “And to think that a weak thing like you killed the Dark Lord…” She lifted a leather-booted foot and kicked him in the side. Harry registered it despite the sea of pain he was swimming in. The tip of the boot was pointed, and Bellatrix had put considerable force into it. 

“You deserve to die,” she snarled, her face turning into a grimace of twisted rage. She spat on him. “I’m going to make you wish you could! _Crucio!_ ”

In vain, Harry tried to throw up his hand, whether in feeble defence or supplication he couldn’t say. 

His body was encased in a whirlwind of fire, burning, burning endlessly, melting flesh and ashes flaking off his bones. His mouth was open in a silent scream as he writhed between the flowers, fingers clawing into the earth as if he could burrow into it and escape. 

There was no escape. The world turned dark inside a roar of pain, with ghostly faces swishing around him, dripping flames and acid over his contorting body, hissing their hatred into his ears. Sirius, Cedric, his parents... Dumbledore, his long beard turning into a tangle of thin, razor-sharp wires that whipped his skin. 

'No, don’t, I’m sorry' he tried to plead with them, but they kept swirling around him, faster and faster, hurting and hurting and hurting…

Animal-like, his mind cast about for something, anything to stop the pain. Something dark and vast and deadly rose from the deepest recesses of his soul, and Harry stretched towards it, begging for help. 

Another tattered face shot past him, triangular and leering, pointy tongue stuck out at him. ‘Don’t use magic – it’ll kill you!’ 

Howling in soundless despair, Harry let the darkness slip from his fingers and fell back into the fire. The curse ate at him, consumed him, and soon, he knew, there would be nothing left of the creature that had once been Harry Potter. Twitching feebly, he gave himself over to the pain, and hoped it would have finished with him soon.

_~ tbc. ~_


	5. Blackmail

Lucius looked into the garden sitting room from behind the half-open door, observing his son. Draco sat curled up on the sofa with his feet tucked under him. He had been sitting there without moving for nearly ten minutes, not speaking a word to Crabbe, who occupied the armchair opposite. Despite his casual pose, Draco didn't seem relaxed. If anything, his spine had become more rigid. 

When Lucius decided to make his way inside, he allowed his steps to echo on the stone floor. He didn't want to look as if he was sneaking up on Draco.

His son raised his head when he stopped behind the couch. 

"Father."

"Draco." He settled down on the armrest of the couch, taking in Draco's pale face and slightly too-large eyes. "How are you feeling?"

"I'm fine."

"I'm glad to hear it." He paused, suddenly unsure about how to raise the topic. "Have you encountered Potter yet?" he finally asked in a casual tone of voice. "The house-elves tell me that he has left his room a while back."

Draco's mouth turned up in a thin smile that was grim and sardonic in equal measure. It made him look far older than his years, and Lucius couldn't help but mourn the memory of the young boy whose carefree childhood had been cut short like this.

"Oh yes," Draco said. Just that. 

"And have you tested the bond as I advised?" Lucius prodded.

Leaning back on the couch and steepling his fingers, Draco nodded. "Yes." Under the force of Lucius' raised eyebrow, he added, "It works. I can't make him do what I tell him to, I think, but I can make him do what I _want_." 

Lucius caught the way young Crabbe's square face reddened before the boy stared down at his feet, and wondered just how his son had tested the effects of Redimio Cordis on poor little Harry Potter. Prudently, he decided not to ask.

"He should be attuned to your needs," Lucius agreed blandly. 

Draco bit his lip. There was a strange reluctance in his expression. Lucius was just about to order out Crabbe to allow them to speak in private when his soon looked at him. 

"I think he's in trouble, Father."

Lucius' brows drew together. "Potter?"

Draco nodded. "I can sort of feel it."

"Through Redimio Cordis?" Alarm flashed through Lucius' mind. "It cuts both ways?"

"No. I don't _feel_ it." Draco shrugged unhappily. "I just _know_."

They were interrupted by a knock on the door. An instant later, Marcus Flint stuck his head inside the room. 

"I'm sorry for interrupting," the young man rasped. His troll-like face was scrunched up in an apologetic grimace. "It's about Potter.

"What about him?" The back of Lucius' neck was prickling. Surely the little fool wouldn't have thrown himself off a gallery – or the cliffs outside? If anything, the curse should prevent him from trying.

"I think I saw him at the garden gate when I came down," Flint mumbled shifty-eyed. "With Mrs Lestrange." He gnawed his lip uneasily. "I thought you should know. You said they should be... kept apart?"

To phrase it lightly! Lucius cursed under his breath. "Come with me!" he ordered, including the group of young men in a sweeping gesture. Then he hurried for the terrace door. 

Although the sun had begun to set over the water, it was still light outside, and once his expansive steps had carried him into the garden, Lucius had no trouble finding his targets. 

There was no overlooking Bellatrix, who stood proudly upright despite the wind that whipped her hair and skirts. She maintained a mock duelling stance, one foot forward, free hand spread, wand aimed at her victim. At first, he could barely make out Potter's black-robed form against the freshly-raked flower bed he lay in. He wasn't moving.

Lucius drew his wand. " _Confringo!_ "

Bellatrix was blasted backwards with a scream of rage.

Aware of whom he was dealing with, he followed it up with a quick " _Expelliarmus!_ before the woman could get back on her feet. He caught her wand as it was flying from her fingers. The urge to snap it was almost overwhelming, but he knew that if he did, he'd have to kill her. And the others wouldn't stand for that. 

Hissing with rage, she sprang to her feet. 

"You were told, _explicitly_ , not to lay hands on him," Lucius snapped.

"By you?" She laughed in a way that made Lucius' fingers itch to curse her down to the ground next to Potter. "Who are you to tell me what I can do, Lucius?"

"I'm the one under whose roof you've accepted refuge," he said coldly. 

"And you've forgotten your duties so quickly," she sneered. "Or are you so spellbound by your little catamite that you're prepared to forgive the destruction he's wrought?" She raised one dainty foot and kicked Potter's prone form in the ribs. It elicited no reaction. 

"You stupid, vindictive hag," Lucius spat. He had to clench his fists to stop his fingers from trembling. Potter hadn't moved; if he was dead, all his careful plans would go up in smoke. "Do you think that just because we've found this place, we're untouchable? Scrimgeour won't give up until we're all dead or in Azkaban. And when they turn up at our door, we'll need Potter. Alive – and sane." 

"Well, the last time I checked he was still breathing." She gave Potter another kick which provoked no more response than the first. "I'll leave him to you, then."

In a move so rapid it was almost a blur, she bent down to her boot, then flicked a spare wand up at him. Hawthorne, dark and gnarled with elaborate carvings. Rabastan's, Lucius recognised with a sting of bitterness. 

"My wand, brother-in-law."

For an instant, Lucius considered refusing, but then it would make no difference. With a sneer of disgust, he threw her what she'd asked for, and watched her return both wands to their respective sheaths at her belt and boot. As if she had no care in the world, Bellatrix turned and sauntered away towards the terrace door. 

"Bellatrix?" Lucius called after her. She didn't turn, but stopped, one hand on her hip and her head thrown back as if she was rolling her eyes at the sky. "If you touch him again, I will punish you." 

She threw him a near-flirtatious look over her shoulder, a smirk on her lips. Lucius couldn't help but respond to the provocative pose. "We'll see." 

Without paying her any more fruitless attention, Lucius turned on his heel and dropped on one knee in the grass beside Potter. The boy still hadn't moved, and Lucius wasn't even sure he was breathing. His chest seemed to constrict when he put his hand on one thin shoulder to turn him over. 

Potter's face was bone-white and dirty where his cheek had been pressed into the flower bed. Even though the Cruciatus – Bella's curse of choice – had been lifted, the boy's expression was still frozen in a grimace of agony. Blood had dripped from his lips or tongue and left a sticky smear at the corner of his mouth.

Lucius couldn't see his chest rising. Only when he touched the boy's clammy throat did he feel the shallow flutter of a pulse. Behind closed lids, Potter's eyeballs were moving. Lucius pointed his wand at him. 

" _Ennervate!_ "

It took two repetitions to drag Potter from unconsciousness. When it finally succeeded, Lucius wasn't prepared for the boy's reaction. Potter threw himself backward, away from Lucius' hands, and curled on his belly in the dirt as if trying to bury himself. 

When Lucius reached for him, he let out a noise like a strangled cat; his vocal cords strained visibly. A quick diagnosis spell revealed an orange rope wound around his throat and chest, fraying but still active. It explained why nobody had heard him scream, Lucius thought with a snarl as he dissolved the silencing spell. Then he grabbed the boy's shoulders and rolled his weakly-struggling body face-up again.

He could only hope that the reaction was a physical response to the Cruciatus Curse. This was Harry Potter, whom Lucius had witnessed been put under Cruciatus by Lord Voldemort himself and who had withstood it. He had to have been at Bella's mercy for a while, but not that long. Then again, he'd been weakened to the point of death only days ago... They'd just have to wait and see about his mental state once he regained full consciousness.

With a wand flick, Lucius cast Mobilicorpus on the squirming boy, then gathered him up from the ground. Potter cringed against his chest as if trying to escape the touch and proximity, but so weakly that it could be easily ignored. 

Lucius cast a glance at the youngsters who'd followed him and were now clustered behind, their body language radiating discomfort. 

"Flint, Vincent, get the house-elves to brew a pot of Grand Pepperup and send it up to my bedroom," he commanded briskly. "And tell them to light the fires in the Potions lab." He turned to Draco, whose eyes were still on Potter with an expression of horrified disgust. "Draco, come with me."

Less than a year ago, Draco would have responded with an eager or sullen, "Yes, Father." Now, he said nothing, just followed Lucius as he carried his weightless load into the castle and up the stairs. Once Potter had comprehended that the arms around him were not causing him pain, he'd sunk back into unconsciousness. His head lolled, propped up against Lucius' shoulder.

When he'd reached his bedroom, Lucius deposited Potter on the now-impeccable sheets, struck by how much worse the boy looked even compared to three nights ago when he'd passed out in the same bed. His eyeballs and limbs were still twitching occasionally. Lucius, who was intimately familiar with the after-effects of Cruciatus, had seen wizards affected this badly wake up sane, but it wasn't the rule. 

He looked at Draco, who was standing just inside the closed door, his face unreadable.

"I will go down and brew some muscle-relaxant ointment." He paused, not quite knowing how to formulate his request. "Your emotional state seems to influence him because of Redimio Cordis. Do you think you'd be able to sit with him, and… try to project positive emotions? Call him back if you can?" 

Draco held his eyes for a second, before they wandered to the trembling boy on the bed. He said nothing, but pushed away from the door and walked over to the bed, settling one hip on the duvet and reaching for Potter's hand. 

Without another word, Lucius Apparated into the Potions lab.

***

It took nearly an hour to brew the potion from memory and from the limited ingredients of the castle laboratory. At last, the fluid had attained the correct shade of caramel and was softly glowing in a bulbous flask. Its gentle warmth flowed into Lucius' palm, making his skin tingle.

The nameless ointment was Severus Snape's invention, undoubtedly born of the Dark Lord's countless punishment sessions he'd witnessed and undergone. Snape's phials had been coveted among Lord Voldemort's Death Eaters and hidden behind a veil of silence among the chosen few who received them. The recipe itself, jealously guarded otherwise, had been Snape's birthday gift to Lucius only weeks after Regulus Black's death, when the Dark Lord's instability became more and more evident. He still considered it among the most valuable gifts he'd ever received. 

He Apparated back to the tower, landing outside the door and knocking softly so as not to scare either Draco, or Potter should he have woken. When he opened the door, Draco had settled on the bed, back propped against the headboard with only his booted feet hanging over the edge. Potter had been covered with the duvet, and lay with his head in Draco's lap, still fishbelly-pale and unmoving. The boys' hands were still interlaced. 

"He didn't wake," Draco answered Lucius' unspoken question. He let Potter's hand drop and got to his feet.

_Damn!_ Lucius set the ointment onto the nightstand, then drew back the duvet. A wand flick vanished Potter's clothes, leaving Lucius with a flashback to undressing the boy for another purpose entirely, made awkward by Draco's presence. Like his face, Potter's body was so pale it was almost blue, and scratched all over from where he'd rolled in the dirt and bushes. A few marks on his shoulders and neck looked as if he'd clawed himself to escape the pain.

Uncorking the flask released the familiar smell of molasses and burned pine wood. Lucius drizzled a generous measure on Potter's chest, then sat down beside him. The ointment was hot to the touch, and would spread its insistent warmth through the boy's flesh and muscles, loosening the cracking tension that resulted from the Cruciatus. Lucius found the act of massaging it into Potter's tense flesh from neck to chest to abdomen not without reward. Once treated, the potion imbued the boy's skin with a soft caramel glow that gradually faded.

"Did you enjoy him?"

The question came when Lucius had reached Potter's hips, and for a second, his fingers froze on the clammy skin. He covered his surprise by reaching for the flask once more, and tried to decipher the emotions that might have drawn his son out of his silence. 

"Yes," he answered at last, truthfully. For a long moment, he focussed only on kneading ointment deep into Potter's hip. "It bothers you." 

It wasn't a question, and Draco didn't protest. He was quiet for a moment, as if processing the information. Then he asked, 

"What about mother? Would it have bothered _her_?"

Lucius was able to disguise his flash of resentment as the memory of Narcissa's death washed over him, but he couldn't un-feel it. He had been very good at suppressing grief because he couldn't afford it. Draco had taken time to mourn, and Lucius was grateful for it even as he begrudged his son the opportunity. 

None of it showed on his face as he turned to Draco while his hands moved deftly over Potter's flesh. 

"No, Draco." This, too, was nothing but the truth. "Potter may attract me for a number of reasons, but the bond between your mother and me could never have been endangered by a mere dalliance with a halfblood." They had always been open about such things – Lucius' preference for young men and women of Potter's build and colouring, Narcissa's occasional fling with voluptuous, shy girls bowled over by her status in wizarding society – more than one of Draco's nurses included. If anything, it had made their marriage stronger. 

"This–" he twisted Potter's nipple in illustration, "had to be done. Your mother would have been the first to understand. She was the most pragmatic of us." 

And Lucius missed her, with the sudden intensity of a predator 's jaws closing around his throat. Narcissa would have understood without a word of explanation; would have understood _before_ him.

"You and mother have never," Draco visibly grasped for words, "given me any reason to think that you weren't... exclusive."

"It _is_ quite private," Lucius acknowledged dryly. "Though I hope we have not raised you to mistake a diversion for the bond between pureblood wizarding spouses."

Draco blushed a little and looked away. 

"Of course not," he mumbled, and then, after a pause. "It's not so much that you... _took_ him. It's more that on a list of all the people I would not want to have inside my head, Potter is among the top three."

"You don't think having the Boy Who Lived at your feet would be a fitting fate for a rather obnoxious rival?" Lucius inquired with a gentle raise of an eyebrow. 

Draco went ever so slightly pink. "It would be, I guess," he muttered. "If I put him there myself."

Ah, pride. Lucius carefully massaged Potter's thighs and calves, feeling the muscles that had knotted like strains of iron loosen gradually under his fingers. A look at the boy's chest showed that his breaths were coming less laboured, and that his face had acquired a hint of colour. Lucius nodded with approval and turned him onto his belly. 

"I am not going to apologise for trying to protect you," he said, drizzling ointment onto Potter's back, then kneading it deeply into the boy's rock-hard shoulder muscles. His skin felt a little less clammy now. "It is something I will never be sorry for, no matter what happens." 

He could see Draco out of the corner of his eye. His head was lowered a little, the bangs that framed his face obscuring his expression. Perhaps his son would remember.

The uneasy silence was interrupted by a young male house-elf popping in with a steaming pot of Grand Pepperup. It bowed so deeply that its ears brushed the ground, and placed the pot on the desk, wrapping it lovingly in a tea cosy before disappearing again. 

Lucius worked in silence, massaging Potter's back, buttocks and thighs while the peppery chocolate smell of the potion wafted over to him. When he reached the back of the boy's knees, Potter's legs twitched a little. 

Lucius slapped his bare arse when he was done, which made Draco look up and brought a near-grin to his withdrawn face. After charming his fingers clean and corking the flask, Lucius pulled the duvet back over Potter's body and rose to his feet. 

He looked at Draco, one eyebrow raised. "Would you..."

"Stay with him?" Draco finished. He shook his head, more bemused than reluctant. "If you insist."

"He should be sleeping for a couple of hours now," Lucius pointed out, testing the warming charm on the tea cosy and nodded in approval when it stung his fingers. "If he wakes up, give him as much potion as you can." Draco nodded and sauntered over to the bed, kicking off his boots as he settles down on the side of the mattress. "He might be confused... but if you have any doubts about his soundness of mind, call me immediately."

This produced a more thoughtful nod, and Lucius decided to leave it at that. 

He retreated to the small bedchamber a flight down in the Eastern Tower he'd picked as a substitute. The house-elves sent up a dinner tray, but he was too exhausted to do more than pick at the food. 

He didn't sleep well. At three in the morning, he woke from a jumbled coil of nightmares, and went upstairs to check on Potter. This time, he didn't knock, just opened the door quietly. 

The two boys were curled around each other under the duvet. Draco was on his back, one arm thrown over Potter's shoulder, who lay with his cheek on Draco's chest as if his reassured by his heartbeat. 

A side glance revealed that the tea cosy lay forgotten next to the pot of Grand Pepperup, and the cup had been used. 

Asleep, his son looked more at ease than he had been for a long time. Perhaps Potter's presence offered him some comfort as well. At least he didn't seem to be having nightmares any more. 

Lucius stood and watched them for a moment. Unsurprisingly, it was Potter who, with the instinct of a hunted creature, woke under the scrutiny. Green-slitted eyes cracked open, then widened in alarm, whether sparked by Lucius' presence or the fact that he was cuddling up against Draco Lucius couldn't tell. 

He gestured to Potter to stay where he was, studying his face. The boy was tense, his cheekbones very pronounced. His eyes had a hollow look to them, but overall, he seemed sane. No thanks to Bellatrix. 

With a sense of relief, Lucius retreated, deciding to leave the two to a few more hours' rest. Instead, he summoned the head house-elf and arranged for Potter to take his meals under elf supervision in the kitchens, ensuring that he'd be kept away from Lucius' sister-in-law as much as possible. 

Then he returned to his bed. This time, he slept until morning.

***

Two days later, Lucius found Potter by the garden gate again, where he was trying to short-circuit the locking charm with a Polipuff. The creature was about the size of a hedgehog, with soft, leathery folds of skin. Drenched in Woodsmoothe Solution, the house-elves used them to polish wooden surfaces throughout the castle.

How Potter had got hold of a specimen Lucius didn't know, but he'd lifted the creature onto the wooden gate, and was now observing it apprehensively. The boy had pulled his tunic closely around himself against the gusts of wind that were never absent on the peninsula. Outlined like this, his backside looked quite attractive. 

The Polipuff was not really up to the job of breaking the locking charms despite its brave efforts. However, it certainly... irritated them, which was what had alerted Lucius' attention in the first place.

" _Incarcerous!_ "

The boy yelped when multi-coloured ropes erupted from the ground and wound upwards from his feet. He struggled without success; the ropes threw him off balance, and at last he glared up at Lucius out of a tangle of colour.

Lucius grabbed him by the collar of his tunic and pulled him to his feet. Then he slammed him face-first into the gate with some force. Potter winced, but didn't cry out. Leaning over the boy's back and pressing him into the wood with his weight, Lucius felt Potter's arse and back against him and bent down to whisper:

"I warned you not to try again, didn't I?" He dissolved the ropes with a thought and pulled back the silver snake bar to unlock the gate. "If you're so desperate to know what happens if you get outside, allow me to illustrate."

As if on cue, the door to the Obliviators' Building across the courtyard opened, and a group of Dragon Sentries in their brown leathers piled out, heads together and chatting quietly. Potter's eyes followed them like iron chips drawn to a magnet. Lucius gave him a push that sent him stumbling into the yard. 

As soon as Potter's feet touched the cobblestones, he convulsed and collapsed. He screamed, his back arching as if the stones were burning. The scream cut across the courtyard, but none of the wizards batted an eyelid or turned in his direction, although they were barely a hundred steps away. The Fidelius Charm kept him invisible to the eyes – and ears – of outsiders.

Somehow, Potter managed to get back to his feet; his eyes flickered madly as he stared at the group, and Lucius could see hope dying inside them. Like a puppet, he stumbled back towards the gate, trembling with every step. 

Lucius put both hands on his shoulders to keep him outside. He could feel the shocks jolting through the thin body with every second he was forced to remain in the courtyard. The boy sucked in a wet, shuddering breath. 

"You wanted to get out so badly," Lucius pointed out. "Why should I let you return?"

Potter stared up at him, lips almost blue, and tried not to beg. He was hopping from one foot to the other in an undignified dance that Lucius enjoyed quite a bit. It wasn't pain so much, Lucius knew – the spell that stopped the boy from entering the courtyard or, indeed, the labyrinth below the castle leading down to Merlin's Cave, fed on his magic, then pushed it back into him tenfold. The feeling of having power shoved into him through the soles of his feet created a pricking sensation that quickly became unbearable. Abraxas Malfoy had used a lower-level variant to keep toddler Lucius out of places he wasn't supposed to go. It was a family tradition Lucius had declined to employ with his own son.

Potter's mouth quivered, and he inched closer to Lucius and away from the cobblestones until he was pressed against Lucius' chest. He refused to beg, though. 

With a disgusted grimace, Lucius stepped aside and hauled the boy through the open gate into the garden. He landed nose-first in the grass.

"Father?" Lucius turned to see Draco coming down the garden path. Coincidence? Or had his weird awareness of Potter's feelings kicked in again? "Is there a problem"?

"Your little pet just made another run for it." Lucius snarled down at Potter, who'd managed to force himself back onto his feet, and was shaking his hands as if he could pour magic off them like raindrops. 

Draco threw Potter a glance that Lucius couldn't quite decipher, but Potter looked away. A light shudder ran over him.

Having closed and locked the gate and renewed the spell, Lucius paused, then plucked the Polipuff, which had somehow managed to hold on through everything, off the wooden latticework. Suddenly suspicious, he sniffed it. Not Woodsmoothe Solution – Doxycide. No wonder the protective charms had reacted! With a flick of his wand, he Transfigured the creature. It let out a feeble squeak before its body turned into a wooden paddle with a soft braided leather handle. 

Lucius threw it to Draco, who caught it out of the air with the easy grace of a Seeker. 

"I think a little discipline is in order, don’t you?" he suggested mildly. Draco's eyes widened, but the curved edge of his smirk showed that he wasn't averse to the suggestion. Potter just looked outraged. 

Lucius' fingers twitched with the urge to drag the boy into the castle and mete out the punishment himself. He could picture it vividly – Potter thrown over the back of a couch, his bare arse cheeks reddening under a flurry of blows, his face pressed into the upholstery, trying desperately not to shriek or cry. And failing. Lucius could feel his cock pressing against the front of his trousers at the thought. 

If he punished the boy himself, there was no way he could walk away without fucking that tempting mottled arse afterwards. And while he _had_ done so before, and enjoyed it, he didn't want his son picking up on what was going on. _Discussing_ it with Draco was awkward enough. And Potter's teenage pride was bound to react much more adversely to being chastised by a school rival than by Lucius, who Potter knew was able to break him.

Potter scowled mutinously as Draco gestured for him to lead the way back to the castle, but allowed himself to be shepherded along without verbal protest. So far, the Redimio Cordis bond seemed to do an effective job in that respect, at least, if not at curbing Potter's bloody-minded escape attempts. 

Draco paused before following, his thumb stroking over the paddle's leather-braided handle. His mouth twitched. 

"I'll see you in the morning, Father."

Lucius Malfoy had learned to control his facial colour at the age of fourteen; he hadn't blushed since. The dry amusement in his son's voice made him very grateful he wasn't about to start now.

***

Whatever had transpired between the two, Lucius never found out. Draco, however, came to breakfast the morning after with Potter in tow, making him stand behind his chair while he ate. Potter stood with a stiff posture and stony expression, ignoring Bella's taunts although his stomach grumbled traitorously at the smell of hot rolls and cocoa. It was an effective display of power, even though Lucius reminded himself to ensure that the boy ate a proper meal tonight – he wasn't back to full health yet, and had been too thin to start with. Plotting to take the battle to the Dark Lord had obviously left no time for regular feedings.

Lucius had little opportunity to think about Potter, however. A frantic Marcus Flint, charged with supervising activities among the Dragon Sentry's Obliviators in their offices on the other side of the courtyard, barged into his study to alert him to the arrival of two Aurors. 

Lucius made his way up to join Flint on the main watchtower that overlooked the courtyard. The entire front wall of the topmost chamber was transparent. From outside, you only saw sturdy stone masonry. From inside, you saw everything.

Over Flint's shoulder, Lucius looked down. The stones of the tower wall were mere outlines that didn't obscure his vision. Indeed there were two scarlet robes among the group of Dragon Sentries, Obliviators and bureaucrats with whose routines Lucius had familiarised himself over the past days. 

" _Engorgio!_ " he cast on the wall

The courtyard zoomed closer, bringing the faces into stark relief. The Auror pair was unknown to him. An older man who looked ill-at-ease, and a dark-haired rookie in his early twenties. If they were looking for Lucius and his fellow fugitives, surely they'd have sent seasoned veterans of Scrimgeour's own inner circle?

"I know the younger one," Flint volunteered hesitantly. "Wei Chang – he was a year ahead of me at Hogwarts. Played Beater for Ravenclaw." 

Lucius studied the young Auror's slender neck; the blazing scarlet didn't flatter his luminescent skin and ink-black hair. "He looks more like the type for Seeker, or Chaser," he mused. 

Flint snorted. "That's what _we_ thought. But he hits a Bludger like an Erumpent. Used to give us hell on the pitch."

The way Flint only seemed to come alive when talking about Quidditch reminded Lucius eerily of Draco.

"He joined the Aurors after school?" he inquired.

"Nah." Flint shrugged. "I would've heard about that. Played reserve beater for the Wanderers for two seasons."

Lucius nodded. A new recruit during or after the war, then. Just as he'd thought. It was too early for the Ministry to have worked through the convoluted mess that was the Malfoy Estate far enough to focus their attention on Tintagel. They would, inevitably. But not yet. 

After a couple of minutes, the Auror pair detached from the group and walked out onto the drawbridge. A witch in pinstripe robes and hat and a burly wizard in Dragon Keeper's leathers followed at a respectful distance. 

They paused in the middle of the bridge, looking out over the water. The older Auror produced a device from his pocket and prodded it with his wand. 

Zooming closer still, Lucius could identify a half disc of copper or bronze, perforated with tiny holes. In its middle spun a circular metal ball, much like a planetary model. The Auror lifted it up and the ball began to spin and glow white. The light spilled through the myriad of holes, fanning out into the sky and sea. The device was straining visibly, and Chang had to put his hands on the older man's shoulders to steady him.

The rays reached into the distance until they seemed to encounter a soft, iridescent mist that sparkled around the coast line when illuminated, then sank back into invisibility when the light faded. Seemingly satisfied, the Auror powered down and pocketed his device. 

"Ah," Lucius breathed. 

"What _was_ that?" Flint growled nervously. 

"That, boy, was Disapparition Mist. I gather History of Magic wasn't your favourite subject at school?"

Flint ducked his head and shuffled. He was infamous for having been one of the very few students ever to repeat a year at Hogwarts. Being Quidditch-mad hadn't helped. 

"It blocks all Portkey travel or Apparition out of Britain apart from a few secure locations maintained by the Department of Mysteries." The Disapparition Mist had only been used once before, during the Grindelwald War, when the Ministry had been frantic about infiltrators carrying the fight into Britain. Now, evidently they worried about escaping Death Eater. That they held Potter captive would have provided an excellent excuse for introducing it. 

Well, they weren't searching for them, then. Just testing the functionality of the Mist from Ministry coastal bases around the country.

"Keep an eye on them, just in case," he told Flint. "But I expect they will leave soon. Let me know when they do."

Then he went down to inform the others.

***

That evening, he'd just returned from a post-dinner drink with his fellow Death Eaters when a prickle ran across his nerves. Closing his eyes, he followed the echoing strand in the web of defensive spells he'd set in and around the castle. A minor alarm in the dungeons. Not an intruder alert – those would have hit him with far greater intensity. And every wizard and house-elf had been taken into consideration when he'd set the spells. That only left...

"Gorm!"

The head house-elf appeared next to him and bowed deeply. "Lord Malfoy?"

"Where is the Potter boy?"

Gorm tucked nervously at the piece of rope that held the knee-long sack around his middle. 

"It had its dinner in the kitchens, then went to bed," he said. "Gorm sent Agha to look in on it an hour ago – it was asleep then."

"Come with me."

Ignoring the stairs, Lucius Apparated directly into Potter's bedroom that had originally been his, although he hadn't bothered to evict the boy after the first night. For a moment, he regretted not having ordered the boy locked in – but then Draco might have wanted him.

There was, indeed, a figure abed, wrapped tightly into the covers with black sticking out on top. In the dim light emanating from the smouldering embers in the fireplace, a careless house-elf might have been fooled. Lucius, however, knowing Potter as the lightest of sleepers unless he was downright unconscious, knew better. 

He pulled back the duvet to reveal two large pillows topped by a wadded-up rag of black cloth. Gorm let out a keening noise. 

"Agha was not diligent enough," Lucius said, voice vibrating with anger. He wanted to strike the droopy-eared creature, but there was no time. He'd deal with the elves later.

With a wand flick, he sent his Patronus out the door. The black falcon opened its beak in a silent screech and flew off to alert the others. Now that the Dark Mark was nothing but a scarred ruin, he had to concede that Dumbledore's communication invention came rather handy.

The Patronus would call everybody down into the main cavern above Merlin's Cave. Potter couldn't have made it down to the sea passage and to the escape boat – it was blocked by a series of spells even more powerful than those on the courtyard, not to mention the Fidelius. 

Lucius Apparated down to the labyrinth, swearing he'd lock the boy in from now on. Draco could just have the key to his room. Or cell. If Lucius didn't strangle the little bastard as soon as he was captured. He deserved to run into Bellatrix!

He arrived at the same time as Draco and young Crabbe, who'd run down the stairs and turned up gasping in the cavern where Bellatrix, Flint and Macnair already waited. The walls were natural rock, if smoothed by the magic which had drilled the corridors of the underground labyrinth into the cliff, then stabilised the brittle stone. Unlike a natural cave, however, it was dry and heated by warming charms. Even the sound of the sea roaring through Merlin's Cave below at high tide was muted. 

"Shall we spread out and search for him?" Bella suggested eagerly. 

Lucius let out a subtle snort. "I have no intention whatsoever of searching for the boy," he stated in a slightly raised voice. He nodded to Draco. 

"Call him out."

Draco closed his eyes. For a long minute, nothing happened apart from the impatient tapping of Bellatrix's foot. Lucius couldn’t suppress a flicker of nerves. If Draco failed, he'd not only have to order a search for Potter despite his earlier scorn, he'd also have to face the inevitable question of whether Potter could be controlled at all. 

At last, a bit of gravel crunched in the left-hand corridor, and Potter appeared. His steps were slow, reluctance written into every muscle of his body. When he stepped out of the shadow of the corridor, all eyes were on him. He walked towards Draco, painfully slow, then paused and looked up. His eyes met Draco's in a way that was not quite a challenge. Then he dropped to his knees and bowed his head. 

The silence was broken by Bellatrix, clapping her hands. "Oh, nicely done, nephew!" This once, Lucius was bound to agree. "If you'd like to punish him, I'll gladly offer my chambers." She swept a bow to Draco, snapping her fingers. One of the round oak doors around the cavern swung open into a dark room. The flicker of torches inside ghosted over black stone and metal. 

Potter clambered to his feet, cheeks heating. Lucius stepped towards him. He waited until the boy's head turned towards him, then backhanded him across the face. Potter's head rocked back, and the red outline of Lucius' fingers started to welt on his cheek. His eyes radiated rage. 

"You stupid fool!" Lucius hissed. "Even if you had found the passage into Merlin's Cave, you could never have broken the defences, weak and wandless as you are." His fingers ached with the urge to wrap around the boy's throat. "And if you had, it's protected by the same spell as the courtyard – how would you've fared, being rendered unconscious in a cave submerged at high tide? Redimio Cordis may forbid you suicide, but it's obviously not a cure for terminal stupidity." 

Potter paled a little. His lips were thin. "Perhaps Malfoy doesn't want me around as much as you do," he said.

Something shifted in Draco's eyes, and Potter flinched visibly. A raw sound escaped his throat.

Lucius, however, had enough. He grabbed the boy by the scruff of his neck, shook him once like the infuriating pup he was, and dragged him the few steps to Bella's door. The woman's mouth lifted, her eyes glittering with excitement. Potter's shoulders stiffened in resistance, but Lucius just gripped his neck more tightly and forced him across the threshold. 

Knowing his sister-in-law's proclivities, Lucius wasn't surprised to see the rough stone walls of the small cavernous room lined with implements of torture: manacles, whips, pokers in a variety of forms, interspersed with Gubraithian fire torches burning with the same steady green flame as all the others throughout the castle.

A rounded stone boulder that resembled an altar stood in the middle of the room. It too, sported manacles at the upper end, rings of animated stone teeth that shuffled greedily, waiting for something to snatch.

There was blood on the stone, visible despite the half-dark, and it wasn’t old either. Lucius' brows furrowed. Certainly none of his own little band would be foolish enough to star in one of Bellatrix’s games. And while he didn’t begrudge her a Muggle or two snatched from Merlin’s Cave or non-magical Tintagel to vent her rage on, he’d have to have words with her about not attracting attention.

Now, he shoved Potter forward until he stumbled against the stone block. When the boy braced himself to stop from falling, the teethed manacles snapped at his hands. He managed to snatch away the right, but the stone teeth clamped down around his left wrist, chaining him in an awkward half-bent position.

Lucius trailed his hand lovingly over the rack of whips on the wall; he selected one, then another, its half-a-dozen leather strands inter-braided with metal wire. 

Potter was still trying to scramble backwards, pulling at the wrist that had been caught, until the manacle drew blood. Lucius stepped behind him, trapping the boy’s legs and hips against the stone. The feel of tense buttocks against his front was quite delightful. He raised the whip, glittering braids coiled tightly in his hand, and stroked Potter’s cheek with it. Craning his neck, the boy's breath caught with horror at the sigh. Lucius smiled down at him, razor sharp and humourless, and put a heavy hand on his neck. With a single pull, he tore Potter's flimsy tunic away, baring his back.

In a heartbeat, Potter's skin had prickled over with gooseflesh. Chuckling, Lucius uncoiled the strands and trailed them over the boy's back. Potter flattened himself against the stone, as if it might offer an escape. His unbound fingers slipped in a sticky patch of blood.

"Is that what you want?" Lucius hissed against Potter's neck.

The boy shuddered deeply, his cheek resting against the stone next to the toothed manacle that was restraining him. Then he shook his head. 

"Are you _quite_ sure?" Lucius drawled. "Because if it's pain you're after, you need only ask, rather than trying to anger me, or insult my son." He pressed the whip's handle between the boy's shoulder blades.

"No," Potter breathed, staring at the stone beneath him, and it was only because it was _Potter_ that Lucius understood what uttering that little word had cost. Perhaps it would be enough.

With a grimace of distaste, he banished the whip to its place in the rack and tapped the stone manacle with his wand. It snapped open. Potter retracted his hand without looking at the row of teeth marks around his wrist. As soon as Lucius drew back, he rolled off the stone, eyes flicking nervously across the room as if he couldn't believe he'd been reprieved. 

Bella sneered, while Macnair scowled as stonily as ever; Draco looked relieved. Lucius grabbed Potter's bare shoulder and swung him around to face the Death Eaters. 

"Another escape attempt, or _any_ sort of trouble from you, boy, and I'll give you to Bellatrix for a lesson you won't forget." Without letting go of the boy, Lucius steered him outside and nodded to the others to leave. When Potter strained against his hold, he shook his head. "I'm not finished with you."

He Apparated the boy into the huge castle kitchen, and wasn't surprised to hear him wheeze and stumble at the sudden dislocation. 

An older female house-elf, the family matriarch, was busying herself with the last of the night's dishes. She gasped out loud and the tips of her ears twitched in dismay to see her Master enter the kitchens. "Lord Malfoy needed only call-"

"Summon your fellow elves," Lucius commanded brusquely. 

She snapped a bony finger, and three more small figures popped into the room. Lucius eyed them coldly. It was the typical servant family: adult parents, fingers and ears thinning with time, but still well of working age, and a pair of youngsters not quite into adulthood. 

"Gorm and Agha," he said, "you failed in your duties, and almost let a valuable possession of the House of Malfoy come to harm through negligence." 

The female youngster stuck her fingers into her mouth and bit down, large eyes wide with horror. Gorm moaned and pulled his ears.

"No!" Potter cried when he understood the implications. "They didn't do anything. It was my fault!"

Gorm dropped to his bony knees so hard it would leave bruises. 

"Lord Malfoy, Gorm is at fault and knows it. But Agha is young. She's never served a wizard before. She knows nothing of the deviousness of half-bloods." 

Potter flinched as if he'd been slapped.

"Be that as it may," Lucius said smoothly, "it cannot go unpunished. I'd order you to iron your hands, but," he nodded to the fireplace that even now, at night, was roaring, filling the room with warmth. "I think this will be sufficient."

He gestured the elves over to the fire, to find Potter grab a fold of his robe and pull. 

"Is that what you were after earlier," the boy snapped, red spots of agitation in his face. "I didn't ask for _this_. Take me back to the dungeon. If you want revenge, hurt me, not them!" Lucius suppressed a grin. What did the boy think he was doing?

"That opportunity has gone," he said curtly. And, to Gorm and Agha, "The left will do, as a lesson."

Potter's grip tightened, and he actually yanked Lucius around. "What do you want, then?" He stepped closer until his bare chest touched the front of Lucius' robes. "Me?" His nipples tightened but, Lucius assumed, with fear rather than arousal. "All right. Just let them go."

Lucius schooled his face into a dismissive grimace. The boy couldn't know how much his body and sacrificial heroism were affecting him. 

"I'm not interested, Potter," he sneered. "I'm afraid you have nothing to bargain with."

He nodded at Gorm, whose ears were trembling. Beside him, the youngster was shaking like a leaf. They knelt before the fireplace and stuck out their hands. And put them into the fire. 

Potter barrelled past him, reaching out to snatch the elves away by their sacks. Lucius aimed his wand. " _Petrificus Totalis!_

The boy stiffened like a board, and Lucius casually put his hand on his shoulder to stop him from falling over. He propped the unmoving body against the kitchen table, face towards the fireplace. There were tears on Potter's cheeks.

The sound of flames crackling over flesh and the smell of burnt leather rose up from the fireplace. It was quite different from singed human flesh, he thought. House-elf skin and bones were notoriously robust, to be able to take the amount of self-punishment they inflicted on themselves. 

The female was making a high-pitched, indistinct noise at the back of her throat, while Gorm's ugly face was distorted in a hideous grimace. He let out no sound, though. While the spell prevented Potter from moving, Lucius could _feel_ the rage radiating from him. 

After half a minute, he said, "Enough." He had no intention of doing long-term damage to the elves, or even crippling them for good. They were too valuable for that. But they needed to learn their lesson. As did Potter.

Both elves pulled back from the fire, Agha somewhat more quickly. She collapsed on the floor, tears flowing from her eyes. Gorm stayed on his knees, clenching his burnt hand before bowing deeply.

Lucius nodded in acknowledgement, then set Potter's petrification to dissolve in a few more minutes and exited to remove himself from the stench of burnt skin. Potter, he left to recover and make whatever apologies he could to the victims of his folly.

***

When the alarms screamed through Lucius' nerves three nights later, he woke from deep sleep with a curse. This time, he'd whip the little bastard himself until he howled for mercy, then fuck him until he'd feel Lucius' cock in that deficient _brain_ of his! It was only when he was awake enough to disentangle the various strands of magic that protected Tintagel Castle that he realised it was the intruder alarm.

He threw on his robe and had just scrambled into one boot when a dark shadow seeped through the door on twisted, spidery legs. Lucius had his wand out and a spell on his lips when he recognised Bellatrix's Acromantula Patronus. It didn't quite scuttle along like a normal spider, but dragged itself on legs bent at an unnatural angle, more like a crab-crawl. Lucius wasn't sure whether it was born of her inability to cast the spell properly, or an outward reflection of her damaged mind. 

"Intruder in the dungeon," the spell creature whispered, in Bellatrix's voice. "Come!"

As soon as his other boot was on his foot, Lucius Disapparated.

This time, he reached the dungeon cavern to find Malfoy and Bellatrix already in possession of the villain. Macnair had wrestled the black-robed figure to the ground, one knee pressed between its shoulder blades.

The left side of Bellatrix's face showed fading traces of a Blistering Hex not fully diverted, and Macnair moved slowly, radiating dull anger that explained the torn robe over his chest as he bound the prisoner's wrists behind his back. An unfamiliar wand stuck in Macnair's belt.

Lucius leaned forward and pushed the captive's hood back. Although Potter had been quiet and subdued since the house-elves' punishment, he almost expected it to be him, no matter how impossible.

When the hood slipped down, however, a nest of ginger hair spilled out. It was the Weasley boy he'd last seen almost taking a wand to the Minister for Magic. Potter's best friend. Arthur Weasley's youngest son, obviously cursed with as much of a temper and as little sense of self-preservation as his father. 

Lucius bared his teeth and sent his Patronus off to Draco with a wand flick. "Get Potter down here, now!" If shot away, grey tail feathers rustling.

The angry glimmer in Weasley's eyes couldn't quite disguise his despair at having been caught. Lucius grabbed the front of his robes and dragged him to his feet. Hands bound, he wobbled. 

"Is there a Trace on him?" Lucius snapped.

Bellatrix passed her wand over Weasley's front, head to foot, then cocked her head. "No Trace, but…"

She went through Weasley's robe pockets while he tried in vain to squirm away, then brushed back the flaps and pulled a crumpled wad of black cloth from his belt. 

Lucius caught it in in mid-throw. "Return Portkey." He dropped the cloth and cast " _Incendio!_ " on it before it had reached the floor. 

Weasley's mouth was half-open in shock, as if the spell had burned his vocal cords along with the Portkey. 

"You should have used it before you were caught," he pointed out scornfully, even though he understood why the young fool hadn't wanted to leave alone. "Now – how did you find us?"

Weasley pressed his lips together and tightened his jaw. 

Lucius waited a few seconds to give the boy a chance to answer, even though he didn't think he would. Then he flicked his wand. 

" _Crucio!_

Weasley screamed and fell to his knees, clutching himself with clenched fists while his spine bowed as if it, too, was groaning with pain. After a few long seconds, Lucius ended the curse. Weasley shuddered and straightened. 

"That, Mr Weasley, was a taster," Lucius pointed out. _I_ can keep this up until you're a blubbering, insane wreck. _You_ , however, might have more to lose. And I can't see it helping your friend."

Weasley's head came up. Bloodshot blue eyes drilled into Lucius's. "Harry. He's alive?"

Lucius' lip curled. "What do you think?

Weasley didn't answer. 

Meanwhile, Bellatrix had been going through the cloak she'd torn off the boy, and was pulling out a small leather case. It was a battered travel potions kit that opened easily under Lucius' fingers. 

On the right-hand side, one small pouch of black velvet sat in its dented space, while two more were empty. 

"Instant Darkness Powder," Macnair growled. "He was throwing that when we caught up with him."

On the left side, the kit held three phials. Two contained a dirt-coloured, thick potion that was immediately familiar. 

"Polyjuice?" Lucius asked, one eyebrow raised. "Not bad."

It was the last phial, however, filled with a clear fluid that drew his interest. He removed the stopper and sniffed it. It smelled just like water. In spite of being quite certain, Lucius let the tiniest drop fall onto his fingertip, and tasted it with the tip of his tongue. Again, it was as bland as water, but it told Lucius everything he'd wanted to know.

"Veritaserum," he confirmed with a stern look into Weasley's face. "How very handy, isn't it, Mr Weasley?"

The boy shot to his feet and shook his head. Macnair grabbed him from behind, while Bellatrix took the proffered phial from Lucius, then pushed Weasley's head back and forced his mouth open with sharp red nails. Weasley actually managed to bite her thumb. She retaliated by leaving a line of parallel scratches across his cheek, then let the standard three drops fall on the boy's tongue. 

Weasley's attempt not to swallow was undermined by the arrival, at last, of Draco with Potter in tow. It was, Lucius thought with a flicker of amusement, impossible to say who was more shocked. 

Potter went deathly pale; his mouth moved without a sound. Weasley gulped and paled as well, the freckles warring for attention with the bloody scratches on his cheek. He struggled against Macnair's grip, then slumped. 

"Are you all right?" he finally asked, ignoring everybody around him. 

Potter nodded a vague affirmative, though his bottom lip trembled. 

"Did they put you under Imperius?"

Potter flinched at that, and Lucius had to admit that from Weasley's perspective, the way Potter walked unrestrained and kept himself at Draco's side was suspicious.

Bellatrix giggled. "No, little one," she crooned. "Potter carries the Bastard Curse. He's one of us, now."

Potter's head whipped around. "I will _never_ be one of you!" he snarled, teeth bared. 

"Oooh," she mocked. "Such bravado, from Draco's little slave."

"I'm no slave either!" Potter spat predictably, while Weasley's head turned from one to the other, incomprehension tinged with disgust.

"You don't believe me?" Bellatrix laughed and raised her wand as if in salute. Then she brought it down in a vicious swish, aiming directly at Draco. 

" _Avada Kedavra!_ " Even as Draco recoiled and Lucius felt dread rushing through his blood like a shockwave, Potter let out a scream of pure, primal terror and hurled himself forward with arms outspread, into the line of the Unforgivable. He pushed Draco out of the way, slamming him into the wall and covering him with his own body. 

The blast of green light fizzed past Potter's face, so close he had to hear the voice of death whispering into his ear. For a moment, he went slack against Draco's body, his face pressed into Draco's shoulder. His voice was muffled, raw. 

"Are you-"

"Never better." Draco managed to imbue the words with the ghost of a drawl, but Lucius knew he was rattled. So, undoubtedly, did Potter. 

"Well, Mr Weasley, I hope you found this little demonstration instructive," Lucius said. Part of him wanted to murder Bellatrix for raising a wand to Draco. Another had to concede that while she might not be brewing from a full potions kit, her aim had always been excellent. "I'll ask you again – how did you find us?" 

Weasley's face crunched up even as the answer spilled from his lips. 

"With a Locator Spell," he ground out furiously. "Combined with a Portkey."

"I thought the Ministry had blocked Portkeys?" Draco threw in.

"Only transcontinental Portkeys," Lucius pointed out. "There are far too many ordinary ones in use, legal and illegal." He stared at Weasley. "It doesn't explain how you made it through the wards."

Weasley stared at the floor. "We used some bits of Harry's wand. Hermione said the connection between it and Harry was so strong it'd get me through most warding spells." He spared Potter a miserable look.

"They let you back into the Riddle House?" Potter blurted out, eyes horrified. From what Macnair had told Lucius, the place had been left a ruin practically waiting to fall down.

"Not quite." Weasley shrugged. "Half of Little Hangleton has been sealed off. We didn't ask – we took your cloak."

"So does that mean we can expect that Mudblood girl turning up next?" Bellatrix inquired, licking her lip. 

"Or the Order of the Phoenix, or a unit of Hit Wizards?" Macnair added.

Weasley gnawed at his bottom lip, struggling. "It's just a single link. Hermione is anchoring it. If she tried to come through, we'd all be trapped."

Lucius nodded. "It is surprisingly advanced magic for a youngster, but no danger to us. The Portkey links to Potter, not to our location."

"But they broke Fidelius," Macnair protested. 

Feeling the unmistakable presence of the spell at the back of his mind, Lucius shook his head. "No. It's still intact. He didn't break it – you revealed yourselves when you captured him. Otherwise, he'd still be wandering about the labyrinth without seeing anyone."

Bellatrix stepped forward and dug her nails into the scratches on Weasley's face. 

"Well, that means we have a spare, don't we, Lucius? After all, you're so obsessed with keeping Potter alive, but if he has to watch his little friend die... painfully... that might be adequate revenge for our Master." She cocked her head at Macnair.

"There is something to be said for that," Macnair rumbled. 

"No!" Potter screamed.

"Rein in your pet, Draco," Bellatrix snapped with a smile on her face. 

Draco's expression turned into an unconscious grimace, but Potter sprang forward, grabbing Lucius' arm with bruising force. 

"No! I'll do anything-" he pleaded, oblivious to Weasley's protesting cry of, "Harry, don't!"

Lucius freed himself and grabbed he boy's arm in turn. He kicked open the door to Bella's dungeon, and dragged Potter inside. After slamming the boy against the wall next to an assortment of spiked chains, he spelled the door closed. 

"I know what you said," the boy babbled. "That I didn't have anything to bargain with. But if Ron dies-" Potter was almost hyperventilating with panic, trying hard to remain coherent. "If Ron dies, I don't care what happens, I _will_ destroy you. And Draco. I don't give a damn about the Curse – I _will_ find a way!"

Lucius slammed his back into the wall again. It finally shut him up. 

"What do you _have_ to offer, then?" he asked. "You already belong to us. We've just seen that you would die for Draco. What more do you think I could want from you?"

Potter's face went very still, though his eyes never left Lucius'. After a long moment, he sucked in a painful breath. 

"What do you want that you don't already have, Lucius?"

Oh, nicely done. So the boy had learned to cut to the point after all. He let his hands slip from Potter's shoulders, knowing he had him where he wanted him. 

"I want exactly what I don't have, Harry." He watched the boy's brow crinkle, whether in confusion or apprehension. "You are bound to Draco, and Bellatrix showed us all to what extent. I've seen what you can do when the Curse compels you. Sparing the Weasley boy's life will weaken my standing. If I should consider it, I want the same sort of obedience from you that you owe Draco – freely given." 

"An Unbreakable Vow?" Potter asked, lips white. It made Lucius chuckle. 

"Anything but, boy. Not for _you_. Don't think I couldn't see you breaking it and dying just out of spite. Your word, as a wizard, on your best friend's life."

"To do whatever you say." The boy's face twitched, as if the words were maggots on his tongue. 

"To do whatever I _want_ , child."

He didn't quite understand the difference, yet. But he would.

"Yes," Potter said simply. "I'll do whatever it takes if you protect Ron."

"Good," Lucius growled. He loosened his grip, and turned to the door. The boy padded after him at a few feet's distance, as if trying to make himself invisible.

Outside, Lucius met Bellatrix's expectant look with a very thin smirk. 

"I've considered your request, Bellatrix. And while it is reasonable, you decided to cross me earlier with Potter, despite being a guest in my family home. That warrants a censure." He turned his head to Macnair. "I put you in charge of the Weasley boy, Walden. I don't care what you do with him, as long as he stays alive – for the moment."

"But-" Potter gasped. 

Lucius turned and slapped him across the face, sending him tumbling backwards. 

Macnair raised an eyebrow above Weasley's red head, but gave the tiniest of nods. Relief flooded through Lucius. 

"You _will_ pay for this, Lucius!" Bellatrix shrieked, her fingers twisting into claws.

"Perhaps," Lucius drawled. "But you should have known better than to cross me." He watched her storm off, then looked at the Weasley boy in Macnair's hold. "If you give us any trouble at all, you'll be culled, boy. Ask Potter, if you doubt me."

Potter shuffled forward, the imprint of Lucius' fingers blazing on his cheek. "Don't try anything, Ron," he begged. "Please!"

Weasley held his gaze for a long, eloquent moment. Then he nodded. 

Macnair inclined his head to Lucius before dragging Weasley out towards his dungeon quarters with a rough, "Come, you!"

There was a hint of relief on Draco's face, Lucius realised when he turned towards him, instantly replaced by his usual mask of disinterest when he saw himself observed. With a satisfying touch of cruelty, Lucius turned to Potter. 

"Well, boy – now that I own you, whatever shall I do with you?"

_tbc._


	6. Battle

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is going to get a bit darker than the previous ones, so tread carefully - you've been warned!

Harry preceded Lucius up the stairs, his back prickling with nerves. He was still reeling with shock at seeing Ron trapped in the same hellhole as he was, and not quite sure what power over him he'd given Lucius, if any at all. An enforced oath wasn't binding, not even in the wizarding world – was it? 

They reached Harry's room just as the first yellow-pink stirrings of dawn began to light up the horizon. Harry's toes curled in the carpet. He'd got used to walking barefoot, but its softness was still bliss.

"Stay here," Lucius said. "The door will be locked for your own safety, and I'll have the house-elves bring your meals."

"You won't-?" Harry swallowed the question immediately. He'd thought he'd figured out what Lucius wanted from him, denial to the contrary, but now…

"I, little Harry, have some things to attend to before I have time for you."

There was an ominous ring to that, and Harry rubbed his teeth-marked wrist nervously. "What _things_?"

"Ah..." Harry shivered as Lucius embraced him from behind, leaning his chin on Harry's shoulder. "Putting a few more questions to your would-be rescuer, to name just one."

Even knowing that he was playing directly into the man's provocation, Harry flinched and turned in the loose grip. "Don't hurt him, pl-"

Lucius's finger on his lips shut stopped him short. "You bought his life, Harry. Nothing more."

Harry squeezed his eyes shut for a second to ease the burning. "I can still ask, can I?"

He felt the smile against his skin without seeing it. "Yes, Harry. You can ask."

While he didn't doubt Lucius' promise to protect Ron's life, fear for his best friend's sanity still gnawed at the insides of Harry's stomach. Ron was here because of him. Might be hurt, or tortured, because of him. Whatever Harry did, people suffered. Even after Voldemort's death, that seemed to be the constant of his life.

"Sleep," Lucius advised, unmoved. "Take a bath. I will come for you later." 

There was nothing to be said to that, Harry thought bitterly.

He remained motionless until Lucius had left, not even turning to see what charm he cast on the door. Then he slumped on the side of the bed. He wasn't at the crying stage any longer, not that hit had ever done him any good. But for a long moment, he allowed dry sobs to convulse him as they wanted. Then he pulled his feet up under the duvet and went to sleep as bidden.

After he'd woken, the day passed at a snail's pace. Harry spent most of it watching the seagulls circle outside the window, sun glittering off their wings. While he dreaded Lucius' return, his imagination taunted him with images of Ron being tortured or worse. 

He bathed; he ate his lunch of bread and thick potato soup, and the cold cuts sandwiches the elderly house-elf matriarch brought him for dinner. She was the only elf he'd seen since the nightmare a few days back, and she served him without a word or once glancing at him. He couldn't blame her – a half-blood's deviousness indeed. He'd been _proud_ of having thought of the decoy to disguise his escape, well, until Lucius had exploded the consequences in his face. And even though it had been Lucius who'd tortured her family, it had been Harry's fault. 

The dusk was already crawling in on a swirl of pastel colours when the door opened again. Harry rose from the window seat where he'd retreated with the mug of spiced pumpkin juice that had come with dinner. 

Lucius was wearing a flowing house robe in charcoal grey that Harry hadn't seen on him before. His hair was braided neatly, but still damp from a shower, and a few strands tried to escape at his temples. 

"What did you do?" Harry asked, his lips cold. 

Lucius threw down two splintered pieces of wood, and Harry's heart wanted to break because he remembered Ron's excitement when he'd shown off his new willow and unicorn hair wand just before the start of their third year at Hogwarts. Harry swallowed. He said nothing.

"Come here," Lucius ordered, and Harry went. Up close, Lucius smelled of water, which was somehow less off-putting than Harry had feared. There was an eerie fierceness in the Death Eater's expression. 

Lucius took hold of his shoulders and pulled him close. Harry felt his neck heat when Lucius' mouth closed over his, but then he'd _known_ that this was what he'd been bargaining for. He didn't balk; opened his mouth a little; let himself be kissed.

"Take your clothes off," Lucius whispered once he'd freed Harry's mouth.

Harry swallowed, but it didn't dislodge the lump in his throat. He undid the belt of his tunic and shrugged it off his shoulders. Paused for a long moment, then loosened the drawstrings of his trousers, and let them slide off his hips a well. At last he stood in front of Lucius, naked and without trying to cover himself.

Lucius' eyes raked over him as if they could leave their hot weight imprinted on Harry's skin. Without preamble, Lucius pulled off his dressing gown, leaving him as bare as Harry before reaching for him.

A tremor ran through Harry as he was pulled flush against Lucius's naked front. Lucius was already hard, and Harry felt his cock pressing against his thigh. Lucius held him close for a long moment, squeezing his buttocks as if laying claim to them. 

Then he ran his hands up Harry's back until they rested on his shoulders, and pushed him down. Harry dropped to his knees, steadying himself against Lucius' hip for a moment. He felt the man flinch at the touch of his cold fingers. Lucius's hands carded through his hair, controlling but very different from Draco's unselfconsciously greedy grip. 

"You know what to do," Lucius said, and Harry did. 

He ran a cool finger up Lucius's cock, then followed it up with his tongue. It took surprisingly little effort to push his own feelings into the background of his mind. This time, he wasn't curse-crazed or too weak to think; he'd struck a bargain, and he'd fulfil it. Thinking of Ron's life in the balance, it _was_ a very simple matter.

Lucius had made it even easier by showering; although the distinct, sharp smell of him was strong on Harry's tongue, it wasn't quite enough to make him sick. He teased the head with the tip of his tongue, then wrapped his lips around it. The foreskin stretched as he probed it, and the tip pressed upwards, warm and salty. Recalling the way Lucius had touched him, Harry allowed the edge of his canines to lightly graze the man's cock, and elicited a slight gasp. A muscle jumped in Malfoy's pale stomach as Harry glanced up. Harry soothed the sting with the flat of his tongue, then sucked the insistent prick into his mouth. 

Lucius tolerated his rather ungraceful bobbing for a few moments before taking control with a tight first in Harry's hair. Harry barely managed a squeak of protest before the hard length was shoved down his throat. It closed off his air supply, and swelled excitedly against the tissue of his gullet. Lucius' taste in his mouth intensified, and precome trickled down the back of Harry's throat. He swallowed reflexively, but instead of getting rid of the obstruction, Lucius' cock slid even deeper. Harry gagged, and felt the unmistakable tap of a wand against his neck. A prickle, and the urge to gag vanished, but tears started to burn in Harry's eyes from the lack of air; his ears and nose were clogging up.

Instinctively, he struggled to pull away but the unforgiving grip held him in place. He wheezed feebly against the cock in his mouth, and could feel Lucius bending down to him. 

"Swallow," he hissed, and then, at Harry's "Nngh!" of protest, "Do it, Harry!"

Eyes streaming, Harry tried to obey, knowing he would choke if he did. He managed to swallow painfully, squeezing the hard flesh in his throat and heard Lucius hum with pleasure above him. Although his eyes were shut tightly, he could see a red mist crowding in on his vision. He couldn't _breathe_ and wanted to bite down and tear out the obstruction in his throat, to claw at the pale thighs, to drum his feet on the floor in pure despair. 

Just when he was sure he'd either lose consciousness or tear himself away, consequences be damned, Malfoy's grip in his hair disappeared and the man all but slapped him away from his cock and pushed Harry backwards to the floor. 

"Enough," he snarled, barely audible through the frantic breaths Harry was sucking into his lungs. When he glared up, there was a high colour in Lucius's face, and sweat was beading on his forehead. His cock strained up to his belly, furiously red and wet. 

Looking inexplicably angry, Lucius pulled him to his feet, then shoved him roughly to the foot of the bed. Harry wobbled, but Malfoy caught him before he could stumble on the mattress, wrapping his arms tightly around Harry's chest. There was no mistaking the hardness that pressed into the cleft of his buttocks, and Harry couldn't help but shiver. When Malfoy had taken him for the first time, he'd wanted a response to activate the Curse. Now, he needed only to please himself.

He could bear whatever Malfoy threw at him, Harry told himself viciously; he had no choice. He let Lucius throw him forward onto the mattress; firm hands parted his legs from behind, then ran up his thighs and kneaded his buttocks with a greed that made Harry's flesh tremble. 

A murmured spell, and a slippery sensation invaded his arse. Harry grimaced at the disgusting sensation and recalled the memory of Lucius' fingers opening him up with cooking oil. After the Imperius warning, the Death Eater hadn't used any magic on him that night. Harry wondered whether that had had anything to do with Redimio Cordis. Now, Lucius wasn't bound by any restrictions. Harry, however, was as helpless now as he had been then, if for different reasons.

The bed dipped behind him, and large hands on his hips pulled him up against Lucius' body. He felt the brush of lips between his shoulder blades, and couldn't suppress the shiver that ran through him. It wasn't pleasure, he told himself, desperate to believe it. It was just his reaction to the absence of pain. He let Lucius hold him and kiss his neck, trying not to flinch away, but could feel how rigid his spine was. 

"Don't fight me, Harry," Lucius whispered against the gooseflesh on Harry's neck. "Not tonight."

Of course Harry _couldn't_ fight. He was trapped in Lucius' arms and bargains, but the request made Harry relax a little despite the cock pressing against his buttocks. The request had felt… personal, in a way bargains were not. 

He still jumped when one of the large, warm hands wrapped around his prick and started to squeeze it.

"Don't fight yourself either." 

Harry could feel Lucius' smile against his skin although he couldn't see it. The bastard couldn't just take what he wanted, could he? He had to try and make Harry's mind and body an accomplice to his own violation. He bit his lip, and tried to relax. The touch was firm but painless, forcing Harry to dig teeth into his bottom lip to stifle a moan. Lucius stroked him expertly, and Harry could feel the strong fingers coaxing his traitorous flesh to fill. Was it even possible not to respond, or was it Harry who was unable to resist being offered a shred of pleasure – from the man who'd abducted, cursed, raped and tortured him? What was _wrong_ with him, Harry wondered.

Lucius's cock pressed against his entrance, insistent and slick, and Harry's stomach twisted in a sick roll. Cold sweat of fear was breaking out all over his body. The contrary sensation of hands coaxing his prick made him shiver.

Being breached… ached, though it didn't hurt as much as the first time. Harry's thigh muscles cramped as he tried to keep himself steady, not slipping away from the intrusion. Not that he'd been able to go far, with Lucius' hand still wrapped around him.

The hot burn intensified when Lucius pushed forward - too intimate, too large to fit without tearing pain, only that Lucius' hand on his cock took away the edge. Without it, Lucius' prick pushing into him would have been excruciating despite the lubrication. As it was, Harry was no less acutely aware of the intrusion, but the pain was spiked with a pleasure that made him tremble. Sweat made his skin stick to Lucius' chest as if they were merging in more ways than one. 

For a moment, Lucius let go of Harry's cock to fondle his balls. Harry gasped at the touch, and felt them tightening as need bubbled up inside him. Lucius used the moment of distraction to shove forward.

A choked "Ah!" that wasn't born from pain escaped Harry against his will. 

"Yes," Lucius whispered against his ear and thrust deeper. Harry's back arched; even the man's fingers plying his groin could not take the sting out of _that_.

He felt stretched beyond endurance, and certainly Lucius would tear him to the core if he made any further move. When he did, however, the tip of his cock brushed the spot inside him that left Harry clinging helplessly to the sheets. He jerked and threw his head back, almost smashing it into Malfoy's arrogant nose. 

Pleasure surged through him in a rush, and his cock hardened. Lucius hummed contentment against his neck, and closed his fingers in a tight hold around the evidence. Harry couldn't help bucking into the grip.

A chuckle sounded against his skin, and then Lucius pushed him down, his palm warm on the skin between Harry's shoulder blades. Harry slumped forward onto all fours, fingers clenching in the bedclothes. 

The change of angle made him whimper. Somehow, Lucius' cock felt a lot larger that way, and the pressure went straight to that damnable spot that turned his legs to treacle and made his cock leak. 

The man pulled out a little, then thrust forward and the pain flared up again. It didn't stop Harry from rising further, though. His body didn't even need Lucius' fingers coaxing him to respond, because Lucius' prick inside unfailingly brushed his prostate.

He could give in, Harry knew – relax, stop fighting, allow Lucius to set a rhythm that would be bearable and propel them both to completion. It would be a relief, and probably quite pleasurable. Harry just couldn't force himself to do it.

"Too much for you, little Harry?" Lucius inquired, slowing his thrusts in mock concern. He withdrew until only the head of his cock was still lodged inside Harry's channel, leaving behind an awful yearning for more. Harry squirmed, beset with the sudden urge to whip around and claw at the bastard’s face. He just couldn't quite tell whether it was inspired by the mockery, or by an instinctive impulse to push back and impale himself. 

"Stop playing with me!" he snarled. All his nerve ends seemed to vibrate, and being honest with himself, what he wanted was for Lucius to throw him down and fuck him without any care until pain and pleasure flowed together in a maelstrom that would carry him away.

"Is that what you want?" Lucius purred, still without moving and for a heart-stopping moment, Harry wondered if he'd admitted it out loud. But no, he couldn't have. His mouth was too dry. With effort, he ground out, "Yes."

"Well..." Lucius traced the indent of Harry's spine with a finger, from the first cervical to the spot right above where he was buried in Harry's body. Then, without further warning, he grabbed hold of Harry's hips and slammed forward. 

The sudden invasion tore a cry from Harry's lips. His back arched and he squeezed his muscles around Lucius' cock to alleviate the burn. Lucius growled and thrust again, rocking Harry's entire body forward. His fingers slipped and scrambled for purchase on the sheets. Like before, it _hurt_ , but there was a trickle of pleasure mixing with the pain like a cupful of bitter potion with dregs of sweet, dark honey. For an instance Harry tensed, then he relaxed. What did it _matter_ if he gave in? He was oath-bound to surrender anyway.

He let Lucius' thrusts rock him as they wanted, concentrating on the heat that ran underneath the burn. It lit a fire inside his groin; his balls felt heavy, and his cock rose until it pressed hot and desperate against his belly. Even as he allowed himself to go limp and submit to the pounding, he was glad that the position spared him the indignation of Lucius reading every emotion on his face. 

Their breaths were rough and audible even over the sound of flesh slapping against flesh. Harry bit his lip. Silence wasn't much, but it was the most resistance he could manage. He felt the pressure building up inside him; Lucius fucked him with short, sharp thrusts that brushed his prostate more often than not. A hot flush spread on his face and chest as Lucius dug his nails into the flesh of his hips. The pinpricks of pain bloomed like liquid fire through Harry's nervous system. 

It was wrong, he knew. He shouldn't respond to such things – he'd certainly not got any pleasure out of Draco working him over with that paddle. Maybe it was just Lucius who'd warped his responses to an extent that his body was protecting itself that way. It didn't stop Harry from opening his legs wider, giving Lucius more room to move. He felt the next thrust almost in his throat. His flesh was slippery with sweat and Lucius gripped him harder, nails slicing deep into his skin. 

Pain flared again, and this time, it propelled Harry over the edge. Lucius' thrust speared him to the core, and he felt heat surge in his balls, sending sparks up his spine as if Bluebell Flames were erupting all over his skin. When it hit his brain, the release was so intense that his vision went white. His cock twitched and spurted fluid all over his belly and the sheets below him. 

His arms trembled, and suddenly Lucius' grip was all that that held him in position. The man continued pounding into him, bending so low that his chest covered Harry's back. Harry could hear the hoarse grunts that escaped him, testifying to a frantic desire for release Harry hadn't expected to witness. 

It didn't last long. The body above him arched in a final rictus that sent a shudder through Harry despite the haze of orgasm. He could feel warm, slick come coating his inside as Lucius' moan of relief tickled his ears. The man slumped for a moment, covering Harry's back like a human blanket. 

Harry's breath was still rasping in his throat as he collapsed face-down on the mattress. His arse hurt, but it was a languid, deep ache that could be borne easily. He could smell Lucius' come on him, and his own, and the sweat of exertion. 

Then Lucius pulled out of him in an aching wet tug and rolled away. The sudden loss of skin contact and the cooling wetness in his arse and dripping down the back of his thigh left him shivering. 

Involuntarily, he ducked in expectation of a sneer, but Lucius just rose to his knees, grabbed his wand from the bedside, and cast a spell. A gust of cool air washed over Harry's skin, cooling and cleansing considerably more gently than the Scourgify Lucius had used before. He could see the sweaty hair framing Lucius' face drying even as the sheets underneath them pulled themselves back into crisp perfection.

Still without speaking, Lucius reached for Harry's hip and pulled him close to his body until Harry's head rested against his chest. For some reason, the fist around Harry's heart actually tightened instead of loosening. Lucius' care with him was, if anything, even more unsettling than his earlier anger.

Still, it gave him the courage to shift his arse to minimise the ache and ask the question that had been burning inside him for days. 

"Draco said you would not touch me because he'd know," Harry said. 

He felt Lucius shift against him. "My son has been wrong before," he stated dryly. And then, after a moment, "Did he? Know?"

Harry shrugged. "I don't know. We don't talk much."

Not least because Harry had taken to avoiding Draco like the plague ever since Lucius had thrown him at his rival together with the paddle. Being bent over the back of a couch, naked below the waist, and being beaten until he'd started to yell and sob, until his nose clogged up with snot and tears and he'd started begging had left its mark.

Harry had tried to tell himself it was because Draco had so badly _wanted_ it from him, had taken such pleasure in seeing his school enemy cry and plead. But deep inside, he knew it wasn't true. He had _broken_ , and not for the first time. Maybe it was the Redimio Cordis that sapped his strength. Or, more likely, fighting Voldemort had given him purpose and resolve. Now that the Dark Lord was gone, Harry was just human, no longer a living prophecy. Lucius had implied as much. Harry hated him to be right. 

"If Draco knew, it didn't disturb him," he finally admitted, for truth's sake. "I think I'd have felt that."

"Mh," Lucius said noncommittally, and ruffled Harry's hair. The little touch was disconcerting; was it approval, or an attempt at consolation for Draco not giving a damn? Harry's thoughts were starting to run together from exhaustion. Since he was trapped against the man's body anyway, he shifted his neck into a more comfortable position, and closed his eyes. 

Lucius' lips brushed his shoulder and murmured something that sounded like 'good-bye' but had to be 'good night' against his skin. Harry let out a deep breath and let himself fall into oblivion. 

When he woke, the early sun was battering the windows, and Lucius was gone.

***

Restlessness drove Harry out of his room after a long bath that tried, and failed, to erase the memory of Lucius from his skin. He hadn't been ordered to stay in his room, and couldn't bear another day of staring out of the window. In a way, chains in a dungeon might be easier to handle than open doors.

On his third round of pacing the corridor outside his room, he saw Vincent Crabbe coming up the tower stairwell. The boy shuffled worse than usual, and heavy grey bags had formed under his eyes. Crabbe pushed open one of the doors Harry had passed, but never tried to open, and if Harry hadn't moved, he'd probably have passed his corner without noticing.

"You!" Crabbe snapped.

"Yes," Harry sighed.

"You're not trying to run again, are you?" the other boy asked, but there wasn't much malice in the question – just exhaustion. 

Harry shook his head. Behind Crabbe, he saw the bulk of Mr Goyle lying motionless on a bed that was about half the size of Lucius Malfoy's, and seemed almost too short for the huge Death Eater.

"How is he?" Harry asked. 

Crabbe grimaced, but didn't lash out. "Hasn't woken since we came here," he rasped. "Probably won't come to again. Mr Malfoy says the Curse that hit him did something to his brain."

"Have you been sitting with him all the time?" Harry asked.

Crabbe shrugged. "Just sometimes."

Harry bit his lip. "Would you… want me to sit in a while?" 

The words were out before Harry could consciously think about them. He didn't _want_ to sit with an enemy, no matter how incapacitated. Then again, Crabbe was looking wretched, and since watching Harry go down on Malfoy, he'd actually behaved halfway decently, in an embarrassed sort of way. Plus, being cooped up in Lucius' bedroom with nothing to do but wait for another _visit_ was driving him crazy. 

Most of all, however, Harry remembered the helplessness he'd felt at Mr Weasley's bedside after Nagini's attack. Mr Goyle wasn't an innocent victim like Mr Weasley, and he'd probably deserved the curse that had hit him. But Harry could imagine how Crabbe had to be feeling. With his own father and his best friend dead, Mr Goyle was the only surviving link to them both. 

Crabbe's rough features twisted themselves into a scowl of confusion. "What? Why?"

Harry shrugged. "So you can sleep or eat or something." Shower, he didn't add. "There's nothing else I'm free to do. Draco wouldn't mind," he added.

After a long pause, Crabbe stepped aside to let him through the door. 

"Look, Potter, if he should wake-" 

"I'll call a house-elf to get you. And Lucius," Harry promised.

The larger boy nodded. "Don't try anything," he warned gruffly before closing the door behind Harry.

Left alone, Harry looked around the room. Like the bed, it was considerably smaller than Lucius', with a window that was basically an arrow slit. There was a heavy oaken wardrobe, empty but for a set of large black robes, and a shelf with some old standard magical text. Harry went through the drawers – no wand.

At last, his eyes returned to Mr Goyle. Despite his bulk, the Death Eater looked strangely vulnerable, unmoving with his eyes closed and his hands folded on the duvet over his stomach. Harry could see blue veins in his eyelids and hands. He looked… very near death. Refusing to sit on the side of the bed, Harry dragged a chair over and straddled the seat with his elbows on the backrest. It took some weight off his smarting arse. 

The room was dim, and very quiet. Mr Goyle's slow breathing barely stirred the air. The first two times Harry was nodding off, he caught himself; the third time, he drifted off to sleep.

It was the sound of the door opening that woke him. He lifted his head from his folded arms, and for a moment had no idea where he was. Then he recognised Lucius Malfoy's silhouette and his frost-coloured braid in the doorway and jumped to his feet. His muscles protested the sudden movement. 

"What are you doing here?" Lucius sounded brusque, angry even. 

"I just promised Crabbe-" he started, but Lucius cut him off. 

"Go back to your room. Stay there."

"But-" Harry wanted to object, but fell silent under Lucius' glare. Crabbe would be angry if he returned to find him gone, but it was better than provoking Malfoy.

He just nodded and made for the door, trying and failing to cut a wide berth around Lucius. The man's hand shot out and grabbed his wrist, pulling him around and slamming him backwards against the doorjamb. Harry's breath caught.

But Lucius didn't strike him; instead, he stepped so close that his chest was touching Harry's, and bent his head back with one hand. His mouth closed over Harry's lips, with a rough urgency that made Harry's neck and shoulder blades prickle. Caught up in the force of the kiss, Harry responded, allowing Lucius' rough tongue entrance and tangling with it until they were both breathless. When Lucius tore himself away, it seemed to take him some effort.

"If I find you out of bounds tonight, you will pay," he whispered into Harry's ear before letting him go.

Confused and uncomfortably aroused against his will, Harry fled.

His room felt as claustrophobic as ever, with nothing to do but trying not to look at the bed, and waiting for dusk to fall while watching the gulls wheel and cry in the air outside. Part of Harry wished the sea wasn't so achingly beautiful.

When the sun had set in a spectacular explosion of colour, the elderly house-elf brought him his dinner tray with soup, sandwiches and a pot of tea. Harry thanked her politely while she averted her head and Disapparated. 

He was just reaching for the tea when the door banged open so hard it almost sprang out of its hinges. Crabbe's bulky form filled the doorway, wand in hand and shaking with rage. 

Harry raised a hand in defence. "Look, I'm sorry. Lucius-" 

The other boy hardly seemed to realise he was being spoken to. "Why did you do it, Potter?" he rasped. "He was no danger to you. Did it make you feel good, to slaughter an unconscious man?"

Harry's brows drew together. If Goyle had died after Lucius had ordered him out…

"I swear I didn't touch him," Harry protested.

"I know what the Killing Curse looks like, you bastard!" Crabbe howled.

Mind stuttering in shock, Harry reeled back. "I didn't!" he cried. "I don't even have a wand!" 

There was no sign on Crabbe's twisted face that he'd understood the words. His fist came up, clenching his wand as if he was trying to snap the thick wood.

Instinctively, Harry hurled the only weapon he had – the teapot. The missile found its target despite the tea that splashed from the spout all over the carpet. Crabbe yelled as it hit his forehead, boiling tea dripping over his face. He wavered while the pot hit the floor, miraculously without breaking, then fell backwards as if felled by a hoof beat from a Hippogriff. 

Harry was next to him in a heartbeat, and pulled the wand from the fallen boy's hand. Nine inches of thick oak lay somewhat unwieldy in his hand, but they did the job. He cast a Somnus and watched Crabbe's hate-filled, red-splotched face relax into sleep even as a lurid bump began to form on his forehead. 

Only then did he start to shake, his mind wheeling. It was Lucius who'd ordered him out of Crabbe's room. But why would Lucius kill one of his own allies, and a childhood friend if Malfoys had something like that? To pin the blame on Harry? _Why?_

Harry forced his breathing to steady. Wild speculation wouldn't do him any good. His fingers were still clamped around the wand. The mere thought of giving it up again was agony.

With a last look at Crabbe, he slipped out of the room. For a moment, he hesitated outside the door of Mr Goyle's room, although it was slightly ajar. Then he pushed it open. The big Death Eater was still lying as Harry had left him, but Harry, too, had seen the effects of the Killing Curse often enough to recognise the unnatural absence of life. The first time he'd seen it had been in Cedric. He swallowed, and raised the stolen wand. 

" _Priori Incantatem_!" 

Although he hadn't expected anything else, Harry was relieved to see that what materialised were only the echoes of a few Lumos, Wingardium Leviosas and Locomotors. He hadn't really suspected Crabbe, but he had to be sure. 

Staring at the dead man, Harry hesitated. He didn't want to be found here. Part of him wanted to find Lucius before someone else could and confront him. It still made no sense that Lucius would have murdered Goyle, but it was the only explanation. Hesitantly, Harry stepped into the corridor. 

The dull green Gubraithian fire of the torches mirrored his sombre mood. Outside, he saw as he walked past the small window of the spiral staircase, the sun was already setting. He was halfway down the stairs when the voice stopped him in his tracks. 

"The hiding place of the Death Eaters who abducted Harry Potter is in the magical keep of Tintagel Castle!" 

It was a Sonorus, but unlike the booming cry he'd heard at the opening of the Quidditch World Cup years ago, it wasn't _loud_. It was just penetrating in a way that no living soul on the island would be able to miss it. It was probably echoing on the Muggle peninsula as well. 

More surprising was that he knew that voice, had heard it almost daily for the past seven years. Wherever had Ron got the wand to cast the spell with, Harry wondered, remembering the broken bits of wood Lucius had dropped at his feet. And what, he mentally added with a shiver of fear, would they do to Ron for breaking Fidelius in this way? Harry tried to suppress the thought that came on the heel of the previous: if Fidelius was broken, what would happen to Draco when the Ministry stormed the castle?

He sensed Draco's apprehension through their link, but knew that Draco wouldn't call for him, not when it might look like a call for help. He was too proud for that, and for once, Harry was grateful. He had to find Ron before one of the Death Eaters did. 

Harry gripped Crabbe's wand more tightly and ran.

***

He shot down the now-familiar stairwells and corridors, knowing that Ron had been handed to Macnair who – like Bellatrix and Marcus Flint – had taken up residence in the dungeons. He threw a sneak peek out of a window when he reached the ground-floor corridor around the courtyard. He could see no lights or torches outside, but all the windows in the Obliviators' Headquarters were illuminated. Ron's Sonorus had carried to them and beyond. There would be a reaction and, Harry hoped, a rescue, but he couldn't wait for it to happen. Ron wouldn't have that much time.

The entrance to the dungeons lay below the main hall, opposite the kitchens. Only a few days ago, Harry had managed to sneak down in the wake of a careless Flint, slipping through the wards even though they had detected him and alerted Lucius. Now, there was no one to conveniently leave open the bespelled doors for him. But this time, he had a wand.

He reached the cellar level, and the small stone chamber that held the stairwell down into the dungeons. As Harry had expected, the door was closed, and the wood practically dripped with hostile magic. Recalling the spell on the portal door, Harry knew better than trying to open it by hand. 

A scream from below cut like a whip through his momentary hesitation. He didn't recognise the voice, it was too far away, but there weren't that many options, where there? 

" _Alohomora!_ " he cast on the entry. The spell produced a flash when it impacted on the door, and lit up the wards in poisonous green. Involuntary, Harry threw a look over his shoulder. The fireworks would sound alarm bells in the castle's master, and any moment, he expected Lucius to come down on him like a ton of bricks. He clenched his teeth and glared at the door. Well, he'd give the bastard some more incentive.

" _Expulso! Incendio!_ he snarled, putting all his strength and rage into the spells. Sheer force blasted him backward through the chamber. Green lighting exploded as the wards on the door shattered, then burned up along with the wood in a conflagration of flames. Searing air rushed across Harry's face. When the flames died down, the door was gone; only metal hinges remained. The stone walls of the stairwell were covered in black sooth. 

Wand still raised, Harry raced down the winding stair, not bothering to muffle his footsteps. The stairs ended in a short corridor that turned once, then opened into the main cavern Draco had forced him into to reveal himself a few days back. Another scream echoed in Harry's ear, much closer this time. Turning once in a circle, he tried to pinpoint the direction. There were several doors and exits, but his eyes caught at one that stood slightly ajar. It was the low, round entrance to Bellatrix Lestrange's torture chamber. 

Harry was in front of it without thinking and pulled it open, aware that he wasn't taking any care to avoid detection, but too scared to hesitate. In the flickering light of the torches, his eyes immediately sought the altar stone. It was empty. Only at second glance did he recognise Bellatrix to the left, her attention focused away from him. Clad in black instead of red, she almost merged with the dark walls. He had to look twice to notice the figure lying at her feet. Ron.

For a dizzying moment of horror, Harry thought his best friend was dead. Then he saw his arm move, a mere twitch that echoed all too familiar pain. Just as Harry was about to cast a Stunning Spell on Bellatrix, she turned. Her head tilted, and she smiled. 

Harry's spell hit an invisible wall between them, striking sparks and reflecting back on him. He threw himself to the side, but felt the flesh on his upper arm go numb. Bellatrix's smile deepened, her lips shaping into a perfect curve of contempt. 

"I'll deal with you later, Potter," she promised, then turned back to Ron. " _Crucio!_ "

Harry's cry of rage mixed with the broken caw that rose from the contorted bundle on the ground. He fired a series of explosive spells at the barrier, but produced nothing but bangs and more sparks. The last spell almost made his vision grey out, and reminded him that he still didn't have his full strength back. At last he threw himself at the barrier, banging against it with both fists and nearly crying with helplessness. 

Bellatrix stopped her curse and gave Harry's futile efforts a toothy grin before leaning over her victim, radiating the air of a cat that was growing bored with the twitches of a mouse and was going for the death blow. 

Harry screamed and pummelled the barrier to distract her attention, knowing full well that forcing him to witness the murder of his best friend would hurt him worse than anything. Ron was curled up as if to offer her as small a target as possible, He twisted a little, rolling himself onto his back just as Harry threw his entire weight and magic against the barrier – again in vain. 

Bellatrix's eyes flicked to him for a mere second while she stood bent over Ron. Just then, Ron's hand shot forward. Something silvery glittered in his palm as he threw a punch at her throat. Bellatrix's entire body stiffened. She let out a strangled sound that wasn't even a cry, convulsed once, and collapsed over Ron's body. 

Harry fell forward when the magical barrier vanished from one second to the next. Catching himself, he raced over to Ron, who had managed to drag himself out from under the woman's body, slow and painful as if every one of his muscles had seized up. Harry fell to his knees beside him. Ron's hand and sleeve were blood-stained and Harry carefully pried the silvery blade out of Ron's clenched fist, shuddering as he recognised it. It was the small knife with the carved blackwood handle Macnair had carried in his neck sheath and which he'd offered Bellatrix for the blood ritual that had laid claim to Harry. Reflexively, he hurled it across the room. 

"Are you all right?" he whispered, holding Ron in his arms as if to support him, when really he was holding on out of sheer relief. 

"Give me a moment," Ron croaked. His shoulders were shaking under his robe, and Harry didn't like the glazed expression with which he regarded his bloody hands. "I'll be fine."

"No, you won't," a hard voice cut across him. Harry whipped around.

In the doorway, pale hair illuminated into a greenish aureole by the Gubraithian torches, stood Lucius Malfoy, wand aimed at them. His face resembled a mask cut from ice. There was no trace left of the man who had kissed Harry against the doorjamb barely hours ago.

"You," he announced, eyes on Ron who tried to pull himself upright, "you are going to die." 

"Don't do this," Harry pressed out between clenched teeth. "Just get out of here." Blindly, he searched for an argument that might avert a confrontation. "Think of Draco!"

Lucius' mouth pulled into a grim line. " _You_ should be thinking of Draco, instead of _that_." He sneered at Ron. Reflexively, Harry reached out for the link, but if Draco felt it, he kept Harry firmly shut out. 

"You can still get away," Harry insisted.

"Even if we could escape, it would mean a life on the run." Lucius' voice was cold as ice, and equally harsh. "No, Harry – if we are to go down, it won't be without _hurting_ our enemies." He smiled, grim and fleeting. "I am sure you are familiar with the sentiment, Potter."

"You killed Goyle's father!" It wasn't a question. Suddenly, Harry just _knew_. "But _why_?"

Lucius's head tilted, ever so slightly. Now Harry, too, could hear the footsteps and voices that seemed to be coming from the entrance hall above. "Would you leave a friend to the mercy of the Ministry?" 

Harry gnawed his lip. Even if their roles were reserved, he could never imagine murdering a friend in cold blood. And Mr Goyle had died before Ron ever broke the Fidelius-

"Now," Lucius said, unmoved by Harry's silence. "First the blood traitor, then you, Potter. _Conflagro!_ "

A stream of crackling flames shot towards them from Lucius's wand, only to drown in Harry's croaked " _Aguamenti!_ " Steam rose between them as the elements clashed, and Harry wiped condensation off his fringe with one hand while casting a blind " _Expelliarmus!_ with the other. It only provoked a condescending laugh.

With another wand flick, Harry dispelled the steam, only to walk straight into Lucius' curse. It snapped his way in a thin, purple line, and hit the side of his chest as he tried to twist out of the way. The impact drove the air out of his lungs in a red haze of pain. He could feel something crack inside his chest, as if one of his ribs had fractured or broken. Gasping for air, it took three attempts before he managed to suck in a wheezing breath that hurt as if a red-hot wire had been rammed into his lungs. Darkness roared in front of him for a moment, then receded. 

" _Sectumsempra!_ " Harry shrieked in despair when the wand came at him again. He aimed for Lucius' thigh and gasped in shock when the man's wand flashed blue and blocked the spell without effort. It looked as if Snape, despite all emphasis on having been as spy in Voldemort's camp, had taught his Death Eater mates more than his own pupils. A memory of Draco on the floor of the prefects' bathroom, blood spilling from his chest, flashed with sickening clarity in front of Harry's inner eye.

"Leave him _alone_ , you bastard!" he heard Ron yell and turned his head. Ron had struggled to his feet, Bellatrix's carved darkwood wand clenched in his fist. A strange mix of confusion and rage that Harry couldn’t quite make sense of flickered across his face as he stared at Lucius. "Why are you _doing_ this?"

Lucius' wand came down in a slash, and another non-verbal spell silenced Ron like a giant's fist, smashing him backwards through the chamber and into the far wall. He slid down to the floor without a sound.

Trembling with rage and fear, Harry threw himself in front of Ron and hurled a barrage of offensive spells at Lucius. The Death Eater blocked them with an air of apparent effortlessness, but Harry noticed the tense line of his jaw. Harry was slowing him down; the question was, would he be able to keep it up long enough?

He gritted his teeth and through about the Killing Curse. He didn't _want_ to kill Lucius, not even after all the man had done to him. Somewhere underneath the rage that churned inside him, he knew it could have been much worse. And what it would do to Draco... Horror shuddered through him at the thought. But here was Lucius, seemingly hell-bent on murdering Ron...

Lucius flicked another lazy " _Conflagro_!" his way, and Harry threw himself aside. The abrupt movement made his cracked rib flare up, and doubled over, sick with pain. He didn't quite manage to escape the wand of fire that was looming higher even than the first. Orange tendrils reached for him and caressed his side. Harry screamed and rolled on the floor to extinguish the flames. The short sleeve of his tunic hung in burnt tatters, and from elbow to shoulder the flesh of his arm had erupted in oozing red blisters. The pain made his eyes water. 

The tip of Lucius's wand glowed red again, and panic surged through Harry. 

" _Sectumsempra!_!" he tried again, desperate to distract the Death Eater from burning him again. 

He expected Lucius to just flick off the curse like he'd done before. Instead, the man just stood there, wand raised, looking straight at him. Harry still didn't quite understand what was happening when invisible blades cut through the front of Lucius's robes. The gashes rapidly soaked the fabric at his chest with dark liquid. 

For an endless moment Lucius stayed upright, face without expression while Harry's mind shivered with hope that it might just be a hallucination. Then a faint grimace twisted his face. His fists clenched, a tremor wracked his body – at last, he fell. 

Again, Draco's image superimposed itself over Lucius' – the way his blood had mingled with water on the prefect bathroom tiles. But this time, there was no Snape appearing out of the shadows to save the day. This time, Harry had put considerable force into the spell, fully expecting Lucius to block it as he had before. Harry dropped to his knees, hands hovering helplessly over the bloody mess he'd made of the man's chest, and realised that even if Snape had been here instead of lying dead somewhere in the ruins of the Riddle House, there would have been nothing to do. The tied-off end of Lucius' braid had fallen on his chest, the fine blond hairs soaking up blood until it looked like brush dipped in crimson. Harry's throat clenched at the sight, and his eyes burned. He couldn't bring himself to touch the man.

Lucius' eyes opened, cloudy and confused for a second, then sharpening as they met Harry's as if drawing alertness from him. Inexplicably, his mouth curved into a smile. For once, it reached his eyes even though pain was trembling at their corners. The knot in Harry's throat tightened. There was nothing he could say. 

"Goodnight, Harry." Lucius whispered, still with that eerie _proud_ smile on his face. Then his body convulsed, and a trickle of blood ran from the corner of his mouth. It was as if life flowed out of him with the blood until his face went slack and the sharp eyes deadened. 

Harry rubbed an angry hand over his face and got to his feet. 

He raised his head when a dull roar came from far below him. The floor shook for a moment like a medium earthquake, followed by the rush of water surging into a previously dry space. Harry grabbed on to the stone block to keep his balance, well out of reach of the fanged manacles. 

When the tremor stopped, he saw with relief that Ron was picking himself up dazedly from the floor where Lucius' spell had flung him. His face was pulled into a grimace as he touched the back of his head where it had impacted against the wall. His back must be one single bruise, Harry supposed. Ron's expression of pain moved to one of shock when his eyes found Lucius. 

"How-" he started, then fell silent after a look at Harry's face.

"He didn't even try to block me!" Harry ground out, voice raw. "I didn't-" He bit his tongue, hard. "We're alive – we've got to get out of here." As if on cue, another faint tremor shook the ground under his feet. 

Ron rubbed the bridge of his nose, then stopped when dried blood flaked away. "Yeah – Macnair mentioned something about booby traps if the Aurors should find their way inside." He looked up. "They should be breaking through the wards, now that the Fidelius is gone, right?" 

Recalling the faint noises he'd heard from above earlier, Harry nodded. "There's no way they could have missed you in the Sentry post. They must have called in reinforcements by now." He hesitated for a second. "That was one hell of a Sonorus – where did you get the wand for it?"

Ron's face closed off so fast as if Harry had punched him in the stomach. "I can't say." His eyes went to a burnt streak of ash on the floor that Harry hadn't even noticed. Harry tilted his head in confusion and Ron burst out, "I can't! It's not that I don't want to – I just can't!"

Spreading his hands in a pacifying gesture, Harry nodded. "It's all right! But the others – Macnair, Flint…" _Draco_ , he cried inwardly, but swallowed down the name before it could escape. 

"They won't come for us," Ron said, still harsh and final in a way that made Harry nod and fall silent even though he was dying to know how Ron could be so sure. He couldn't quite believe Ron had managed to dispatch three Death Eaters. And if he had, why did he refuse to say so?

Another hissing sound from below, and Harry's stomach clenched. There was no time for this – they had to get out of the Castle and find Dra-

" _Father!_ "

The shriek cut through Harry's very essence, more painful than Lucius' Cruciatus, worse than _anything_ he'd ever experienced. 

He whirled around to see Draco stumbled against the doorjamb, eyes wide and terrified. Harry doubled over from the grief that pounded through him. Then Draco's wand came up, and a grimace of rage spread across his face. 

Harry forced himself to move, even though he _deserved_ being cut down on the spot. But there was more at stake than Draco's feelings. He threw himself at the other boy, swinging his fist reflexively before Draco had reached " _Avada-_

His fist impacted on Draco's chin with a dry sound, wincing at the pain that shot through his knuckles. Reason dissolved in Draco's eyes, and Harry managed to grab him just in time to prevent him from hitting the ground. Moaning, Harry nearly collapsed on top of the body he was trying to catch. He heard Ron race up to him, then felt his arm around his shoulder. Harry's head ached as if it was splitting apart, and he wondered whether somebody had rammed a knife into his chin although it was Draco who'd been hit, and Draco was unconscious. Forcing himself to concentrate, he unloaded Draco into Ron's arms. 

Ron stared down at his armful of ferret as if not quite sure whether to go 'Ew!' and drop it. Before he could complain, the sound of excited voices sounded from above, followed by footsteps on the stairs. Harry clutched his wand and Ron leaned forward to pick up Bellatrix's again with a grimace of distaste. 

"It's the Aurors," he announced. "It's got to be." 

"Do we have a means of getting out?" Harry asked.

"I guess," Ron rasped. "If Malfoy's dead – Lucius, I mean – the Anti-Apparition field should be down."

"Could you Apparate Draco out of here if necessary?" Harry asked. He saw Ron open his mouth to protest, and grabbed two fistfuls of cloth at his throat. "Please, Ron!" Ron's eyes widened, and Harry let him go, cheeks flushing with shame. "I need him out of my hair and safe, or I can't function." He bit his lip. " _Please!_ "

He knew he wasn't fair to Ron; he'd been tortured and perhaps worse, but he _needed_ Malfoy out of the way. 

"I'd feel better doing it from above ground," Ron muttered. "But yeah, I guess I can."

"If you have to, take him directly to Grimmauld Place," Harry said. "Don’t let the Ministry get their hands on him." He paused, then pleaded, "And for the love of god, keep him unconscious."

Ron shrugged in agreement as Harry cast a Levitating Charm on Draco's limp body. It floated upwards as if carried on an invisible bier. In unspoken agreement, they made their way out of the chamber to wait for the footsteps to approach. It wouldn’t be a good idea to be caught at the site of the carnage, and Harry was glad to get away from the bodies, for both their sakes. By the time they'd crossed the main cavern, the first face appeared around the corner behind a wand tip, and framed by a scarlet Auror collar. A long ponytail flowed down the man's back. For a moment, it looked to Harry if it was soaked in blood.

Harry shook his head to chase away the illusion. He had seen the Auror before, at the Ministry for Magic with Mr Weasley, and in the Department of Mysteries. Williams? No, Williamson. The Auror's nose was slightly wrinkled, but his eyes widened when he saw them. 

Before he could say anything, a smaller figure appeared behind the Auror, then pushed him out of the way with a cry of “Harry! Ron!” 

In jeans and a powder-blue sweatshirt, Hermione had dispensed with all wizarding trappings. Her braid was struggling to escape in several directions as she threw herself at them, hugging Ron and Harry while laughing and sobbing at the same time. She barely glanced at Draco’s body hovering in the air.

Ron pulled her close and kissed her forehead that had crinkled at the sight of Harry’s blistered arm. “It worked, Hermione! I just didn’t expect to be captured.”

“Oh, I should have considered Fidelius, I can’t believe I didn’t even think of it!” Hermione fretted, freeing herself from Ron’s embrace to examine Harry’s shoulder more closely. 

“Miss Granger, I _ordered_ you to stay back.” Auror Williamson looked very sour. “This is no place for a civilian. We haven’t run the mandatory Polyjuice Detection Protocols yet – they may not be Potter and Weasley, but the fugitive Death Eaters disguised to trick us." It was obvious that he was trying to gain the upper hand for the benefit of his colleagues, who were now crowding the corridor and the staircase's exit.

Hermione barely glanced at him. "Don't be ridiculous." She raised her wand to cast a healing charm on Harry's blistered shoulder. Pain flared for an instant, then receded to a bearable dull ache. He smiled at her gratefully. 

"What do you know about the whereabouts of the fugitive Death Eaters," Williamson asked, trying to regain the initiative. "Malfoy, Lestrange, Macnair?"

"Lucius Malfoy is dead," Harry said, clear and loud, looking straight at Williamson. No one could see that his eyes burned. "I killed him." He felt their shocked gazes on him. Their surprise wasn't as great as it would have been before the defeat of Voldemort. But they'd expected to come to his rescue – they hadn't expected to walk into the aftermath of battle. Williams, that much was clear, was not pleased. "Bellatrix Lestrange is dead too," he continued calmly. "The others…"

"I left Macnair and Flint stunned below," Ron threw in, sounding just as calm. A prickle of disbelief crept up Harry's back. Ron showed no sign of the mumble that tended to slip into his voice when he lied. But the tell-tale flush was travelling up his neck. Harry saw Hermione lift an eyebrow, and knew she'd noticed it too. "That was before Malfoy's trap charms went off and the lower areas of the cave were flooded," Ron continued. "I don’t think they're still alive." 

"Do you have any evidence for your claims?" Williamson snarled. Without a word, Harry inclined his head towards the door to Bellatrix's chamber. Mouth tight, Williamson waved a quartet of his Aurors towards it. 

They disappeared into the room, only to reappear a few moments later, rather pale, to wave Williamson over to them. When _he_ returned, his face was grim, but at least he didn't seem to doubt their words any longer. 

"Dawlish, take your team and find the entrance to the lower levels. The Minister expects us to bring in all the fugitives, dead or alive."

"Are you out of your mind?" Ron cried. "Did you somehow overlook that the bloody place is coming down? I don't think it's going to stop because the Minister wants it!" 

"I don't take my orders from hysterical youngsters, Mr Weasley," the Auror snapped. There was a high colour in his cheeks. 

"The 'hysterical youngsters' know that Lucius Malfoy's death triggered enough trap charms to blow up the place," Ron cried. 

“You should really get your men out now,” Harry threw in. "The Obliviators' Headquarters are part of the castle. They should be warned to evacuate as well." 

"I wish they'd sent somebody with a bit of common sense," Ron complained. "Where's Kingsley Shacklebolt when you need him?"

“Mr Shacklebolt has been suspended from his duties by the Minister for Magic for conduct unbecoming an Auror," Williamson snarled. "He isn’t in command of this squad – I am.”

“Well, I don’t care,” Harry shot back. “And unlike the Minister, Kingsley never left me behind to die. But you might want to get _your_ squad out of here before the entire castle falls down.”

Williamson looked unhappy, but being crushed under an avalanche of crumbling stones obviously didn’t appeal to him either. 

“I’ll take the prisoner into custody now, and arrange for you and Mr Weasley to be transported to St Mungo’s for medical treatment,” he announced.

Harry suppressed the urge to smash his fist into the Auror’s snobbish face at the prospect of losing Draco to him. His eyes went to Ron, pleading.

He saw Ron’s lips compress for an instant, then his face went white and resolute. He gripped Draco’s paralysed arm as if to float him over to the Aurors.

Shame and dread welled up inside Harry in equal measure. He had no right to ask this of Ron, who was as exhausted and hurt. Side-along Apparition required strength Ron didn't have to spare – and what would happen to Draco if he failed? 

One of the Aurors stepped forward eagerly to take Ron's unconscious burden off his hands, and jumped back with a shriek when the two young men Disapparated practically from between his fingers. 

"What-?" Williamson screeched, and even Hermione stared at Harry in shock. Her hand clamped around Harry's wrist, and he mouthed an apologetic 'Later!' to her. 

"You see, both Ron and I are fine leaving under our own power," Harry said. 

"Where did he take Malfoy?" Williams demanded, 

Harry shrugged. "Oh, outside, I'm sure," he said vaguely. 

A tremor went through the chamber, sending dust and gravel to rain down from the ceiling. A long crack appeared in the floor. "As we should be," he added.

He grabbed Hermione's hand and pulled her towards the stairs.

"Ron is all right," he whispered. And he had to be – at least Draco wasn't hurt or splinched. Harry would have felt it – or died with him, if things had gone wrong. 

An ear-splitting thunder rose from the far end of the cave, and the pair of Aurors that had been guarding Bellatrix' chambers jumped backwards. As if in suspended animation, walls and ceiling came tumbling down.

One of the pair cried out as a slab crashed onto his foot, sending him to the ground howling. The other, a younger man with strangely familiar Asian features under a cap of ink-black hair grabbed him around the waist and Apparated him out of the debris, leaving only crimson smears of blood behind. 

With a last glance at the deluge, Harry threw himself into the stairwell that was already starting to creak ominously, pulling Hermione with him. Her hand in his, slender and dry, was comforting. Still, his chest ached so much that his eyes spilled over when they'd reached the top. Harry half-collapsed against the corridor wall, watching the remaining Aurors race past him towards the exit like scarlet flashes. 

"I'm ok," he wheezed in response to Hermione's concerned face. 

He grabbed the sleeve of Williamson's' scarlet robe as he came out of the stairwell, the last of his group. "There's a group of house-elves too," he gasped. "Can you order them to evacuate?" 

The Auror stopped and briefly shook his head. "If they were registered with the Office for House-Elf Relocation I could, but here? These old pureblood strongholds expect their elves to go down with them. They wouldn't obey me."

"But that's horrible!" Hermione cried out. 

"That's Death Eaters for you, Miss Granger." He turned to Harry. "Now, Mr Potter, you're injured and exhausted. I insist that you let me convey you to St Mungo's."

"No," Harry said flatly. "We'll manage." He kept his hand on his wand do warn off any aspirations to 'convey' him by force. 

"The Department for Magical Law Enforcement will want to interview you and Mr Weasley, and take Draco Malfoy into custody." The thought of returning to his bosses empty-handed from what should have been a publicity-worth rescue stunt sat uneasy on Williamson, that much was clear. 

"They can call at Grimmauld Place once Harry and Ron have had time to recovered, I'm sure," Hermione interjected.

Williamson bared his teeth at them, obviously itching to cast something along the lines of Imperius, or to order his men to overrun them., he turned and stormed towards the exit. After a moment's hesitation, the other Aurors followed.

As soon as they were out of earshot, Harry pulled Hermione towards him and whispered, "I left Vincent Crabbe under a sleeping charm in the west tower, top floor, the room at the very end. Do you think you could try to get him out, and Apparate him to Grimmauld Place? It's where Ron should be," he added.

She pursed her lips, then nodded. "But Harry, the house-elves…"

"They wouldn't listen to you," Harry said with a touch of bitterness. "That's why I'm asking you to go for Crabbe. Because they might listen to me." 

"Be careful!" she hissed, low and intense.

"You too." Harry squeezed her fingers again before she pulled away, wand already raised in a 'Point me!' spell. As soon as her wand flashed, she sped down the corridor with her braid bouncing behind her.

Feeling the flagstones shaking under his bare soles, Harry raced towards the kitchens, trying not to limp too badly. His blistered shoulder still ached, and he felt every one of the burns and bruises on his body. And yet, he dared not slow down. He had a debt to repay. 

When he threw the kitchen door open, he found the cavernous room empty and almost collapsed with exhaustion. His chest hurt so much that he couldn't breathe and it took moments of frantic wheezing to halfway recover. The kitchen floor was littered with shards where the pots that had lined the shelves and tops of cupboards had shattered. Another convulsion shook the castle. Harry had to jump aside as some of the flagstones rose and shifted over each other. 

"Gorm!" he screamed.

For an endless moment, Harry was certain that nothing would happen. Then, with a *pop* that was almost… languid, the house-elf appeared in front of the hearth. His bare, leathery feet didn't seem to feel the debris he was standing on. A lighter *pop*, and the elderly female that had served Harry for the past few days appeared behind him.

"You've got to get out of here," Harry said. "Gather the others, and hurry!"

He received only a hostile glare. "The halfblood has murdered our Master and destroyed our Home. We will not obey it."

"You have to leave or you'll _die_!" Harry yelled.

"Gorm's kind are bound to the dwelling they serve. His family has cared for it for nearly a thousand years. They will _not_ desert it at the call of a halfblood murderer." The house-elf looked steely in a way Harry had seen in Dobby when he'd defended Harry against Lucius after the Riddle diary debacle at Hogwarts.

"Gorm, you and Agha were punished for endangering 'valuable Malfoy property'," Harry said, as rationally as he could with the ground trembling around him so hard that the shards were sliding over the floor. "Lucius Malfoy is dead. But his son lives, and you are bound to him no less than I am. Draco is Lord Malfoy now, and if you kill yourselves, you'll rob him when he needs you most."

An odd mixture of fury and thoughtfulness slipped into the house-elf's expression. He glared at Harry for a long moment, then hissed, "Agha and Gesp will be sent to Master Malfoy. They are young and can be forgiven. Gorm and Eshi will not shame their home thus."

Beside him, Eshi's ears twitched, whether at the thought of the young elves' disgrace or her own fate Harry couldn't say. She was still careful not to meet his eyes. Harry's jaw clenched. 

"No," he said. "Draco Malfoy requires _all_ of you." 

A dull roar sounded far below, followed by the sound of water rushing upwards. Again the walls shook, and a crack started to form in the kitchen wall, cobweb-fine at first, then widening. 

"The murdering halfblood should leave," Gorm pointed out with a malicious expression. "It may not die." 

Harry could almost understand the impulse that seemed to draw Gorm to self-destruction: the same helpless rage and entrapment Harry had felt so often at Lucius' hands. He shook his head. "I will not leave without you," he said with calm determination. 

Maybe with Draco out of it and the hope that Ron and Hermione would watch over him, he could make good his threat.

He stumbled and nearly fell when one of the stones broke out of the ceiling and shattered on the floor between them, spraying shards and dust everywhere. The female house-elf gave a muffled squeak and crouched down, covering herself with her hands. Harry threw his head back and realised that the cracks hadn't stopped at the walls. Lightning-shaped cracks were running through the remaining stones above his head, as if to mimic the scar on his forehead. More cracks started to run from the corners of the floor. With a sudden, painful lurch of his stomach, Harry understood that perhaps it was already too late for rescue or escape. Fear closed his throat.

"The halfblood will not leave?" This time, Gorm's voice was definitely mocking. Dust was covering the house-elf's ears and shoulders. Above them, another flagstone was moving. It slipped, then caught itself on a ledge. 

Panic raced through Harry. He doubled over; pain shot through him as if a thorn-clad, mailed fist was closing around his stomach. Redimio Cordis. Water shot into his eyes, and it took all his strength to shake his head.

Perhaps it was what Gorm had been hoping for, he thought, clutching his belly. Perhaps this was his way of taking revenge for Lucius' death. Perhaps, a traitorous voice whispered at the farthest back of Harry's brain, it was what he deserved.

Another tremor hit the castle like a titan's blow. Under Harry's feet, the thin cracks widened, shook. 

Then Gorm pointed a long, spindly finger at him. Through the noise, his voice was thin and brittle. "The halfblood is Draco Malfoy's. It needs to serve."

As the flagstones shattered below Harry's feet and the ceiling started to collapse above him, a surge of magic caught him and threw him out of the collapsing kitchen, away from Tintagel Castle and towards the fate that Lucius Malfoy had mapped out for him.

_~ tbc. ~_


	7. Bargain

"I still think it's a bad idea," Ron announced, arms crossed in front of his chest in a mutinous gesture. "Let the little bastard sleep until you're well again. We can tell the Ministry that he's too weak to be transported. As far as I'm concerned," he muttered to himself, but audible enough, "you can just keep him under Dreamless Sleep for good."

"No!" Harry snapped, harsher than he'd intended. "He may be sleeping, but he knows he shouldn’t. I feel it. It's driving me crazy!"

"Are you sure it's that?" Hermione asked, in that careful tone Harry hated because it implied that he was _fragile_. "You still haven't fully recovered, and we know so little about that curse – perhaps you should see the Healers at St Mungo's after all." She bit her lip. "They might even know of a cure?"

Harry expelled a breath and glanced at the floor-length mirror in a gothic serpent-latticework frame that ornamented the corridor. A bone-white, worn zombie looked back at him from under a shock of tousled black hair. Granted, some demented Black had charmed it to reflect an exaggeratedly bad image – which meant that he probably looked a little less dreadful than he felt.

"No," he objected. "There is no cure, or you," he smiled weakly at Hermione, "would have found it. And if I go to St Mungo's, I'll be the poor victim with his mind enslaved by Death Eaters. It'd give Scrimgeour the perfect excuse to dismiss me, to lock me up for my own good, even." Then they would be able to take Draco, who was restlessly sleeping the days away behind the adjacent door, and that'd mean that Harry, too, would never be free again. He'd die to prevent that.

"But if you wake him, he can hurt you," Ron protested. "That's how the Bastard Curse works, isn't it?" 

"I know," Harry said. He raised both palms to silence further argument. "But I have to wake him sooner or later, so let me get it over with, all right?"

Before he could find a reason to procrastinate further, he pushed open the door to Draco's room. It was one of Grimmauld Place's typically dark and claustrophobic bedrooms, improved somewhat by Agha's and Gesp's compulsive cleaning and dusting. The young house-elves had already arrived, huddled in a tangle of misery, when Gorm had cast Harry out of Tintagel to land at Draco's feet. Still shy and very quiet, they had thrown themselves into brightening up their sleeping Master's surroundings, avoiding Kreacher along with everyone else. 

Now, Gesp was fluffing up Draco's pillow while Agha was just closing the freshly cleaned window. The glass pane sparkled and even a few sunbeams dared enter. For Grimmauld Place, that was quite a success. Gesp returned the pillow to the bed and laid Draco's sleeping head back down with a gentleness that tugged at Harry. The young elf's wide, bulbous eyes were less gentle. 

"The halfblood shouldn’t keep Master Malfoy like that!" he hissed, spindly arms crossed in front of him very much like Ron's earlier. 

"Don't call him that!" Ron bellowed, and the youngster shrank back against the bedpost, trembling.

"It's all right," Harry pacified. "I've heard worse. And it's true."

Harry's eyes found Gesp's, searching in vain for a hint of Gorm's steely contempt. He didn't even know whether Gorm and Eshi had been the youngster's parents – he had no idea how house-elves reproduced. He only knew that, whatever they had been, he'd failed to save them. He deserved Gesp's anger.

"I'm here to wake him," he promised the siblings. "But before that, there's something you should know."

He glanced at Agha, who'd stepped up and peered in his general direction from behind Gesp's shoulder. Her left hand was still wrapped in a white strip of bandage, even though Harry knew Hermione had had a look at it. Younger house-elves, she'd said, were more vulnerable to injury than adults. 

"Draco Malfoy is in great danger," he explained. "The Ministry for Magic wants to take him away to Azkaban, or perhaps worse." He heard two near-identical gasps. Agha pressed her undamaged hand to her mouth; Gesp's wide eyes were watering. "He will be… very upset when he wakes," Harry continued, aware of just how much of an understatement that was. "I will do whatever I can to keep him from the Aurors, but for his own safety, if he asks you to help him escape, don't." 

Their expressions went very nervous and Harry decided to leave it at that. Any further pressure would only alienate them. He stepped aside and watched Hermione take out her wand, not quite trusting himself to cast a spell on Draco with the wand that had belonged to Goyle senior, and now served as his own. Still, a tingle of unease ran through him as she aimed at the sleeping Slytherin.

" _Ennervate!_ "

First Malfoy's lip twitched, then his nose. His eyelids fluttered. When his eyes opened, they were an unfocussed, cloudy grey that took time to sharpen into awareness. Even then, he only looked up at Harry with a touch of confusion crinkling his forehead. 

When it cleared, it was replaced by a flash of rage that made Harry shrink backwards. For once, Draco's mind was unguarded, yawning before Harry with a boiling red-hot hatred that spilled over him like acid. Harry vaguely realised that he cried out and slumped forward before Draco's rage consumed him utterly. It scalded him, no less painful than the Cruciatus, although it was not physical, just Draco's single-minded desire to hurt, tear, avenge himself. 

When Ron's roar of "Leave him _alone_ , Malfoy!" distracted Draco enough for Harry to come back to his senses, he found himself on his knees, whimpering and rocking back and forth. 

"If you think you can hurt him like that, I'll knock you straight back out, you bastard," Ron threatened. 

"So you think I should be all kindness to the rat who just killed my father?" Draco shot back. Harry could feel the fury lick at him again, if a little muted for being directed at Ron.

He bit his lip and painfully clambered to his feet, clamping one hand around the bedpost to hold himself upright. 

"Leave us alone for a moment, all right?" he forced out from between cracked lips.

"No way!" Ron yelled over Hermione's calmer, "Do you think that would be wise, Harry?"

"Yes," Harry insisted, although it was anything but. 

Malfoy just speared him with a glare that made him dig nails into his palms and sent a tremor through him.

The house-elves disappeared first, with two soft pops. After a tense moment, Hermione put a hand on Ron's arm.

"Please, Ron," Harry said.

"Hurt him again and I'll make you regret it," Ron snarled at Malfoy as he allowed Hermione to usher him towards the door.

"Yes, Weasley, I'd love to see you try," Malfoy drawled after him. "Especially since he'll get to feel everything you could do to me." Harry felt a titter of malicious amusement through Draco's rage. "That'd be worth it just to see you watch."

Harry saw the furious glare Ron threw over his shoulder when Hermione pulled him out of the door, and wished they hadn't agreed to leave. Malfoy shot him a dark look. 

"Did you send them away so you could beg my forgiveness in private?"

Harry shook his head. "I'm not going to ask for something you can't give."

"That's right," Draco snarled, pulling up his knees so he was sitting with his back against the headboard. "I don't want your apologies– I want you dead." 

Harry gritted his teeth. "Well, I'm not going to die no matter how much you want it."

A flare of pain shot through him a second later, making him clutch the bedpost tightly. Sheer obstinacy was all that kept him upright, and Malfoy knew it. A knife-edged smirk bent his lips. 

"How long do you think you can hold out before you'll _want_ to kill yourself?" 

"As long as it takes," Harry hissed.

If anything, Malfoy's smirk deepened. "I can feel how weak you are, Potter. I can hurt you worse than you can imagine. And if that doesn't work? If I kill myself, you _will_ die with me. I find that very fitting."

"You won't," Harry said brutally. "You're a survivor. You wouldn't kill yourself for anything, even vengeance. And it would be like spitting at your father's memory. After all, he prepared us for a situation just like this."

"Don't you dare mention my father!" Draco yelled. "You _murdered_ him!"

"He left me no choice," Harry said softly. 

"I don't care!" Draco yelled back. "I'd take him over a dozen of you!"

Exhaustion crashed over Harry. "I know." He couldn’t quite blame Draco for it either.

"So why the sudden urge to face me?"

"Because I haven't managed an hour of uninterrupted sleep since we escaped," Harry admitted.

Draco clicked his tongue. "How long?"

"Three days."

The other boy's expression didn't change. "You look like it," he commented, then cocked his head. "And it's the Redimio Cordis? Not... something my father cast when you duelled? Like a Bane of Insomnia?"

Harry bit his lip. "Lucius cast battle spells. Nothing like that."

"So you can't keep me drugged and shut away without suffering for it?" A dark smirk spread over Draco's face. "I like it."

"I hadn't considered it as a long-term solution," Harry protested. 

"Then why wake me now?" Draco shot back. "What do you want from me?"

"The Ministry have been pelting us with owls that they want to take you to Azkaban and 'interview' Ron and myself about what went on at Tintagel." Harry pressed his lips together. "The first is out of the question – I won't let them take you. And we're not at all eager to discuss the rest either. But I have to talk to Scrimgeour sometime soon before he sends a troop of Aurors to storm Grimmauld Place. And for that, I need to be awake and on my toes."

"A truce..." Malfoy murmured, and Harry was intimately aware of the anger that bubbled underneath his stony mask. Anger, and fear.

"I know that you can cut yourself off from me if you want to," he persisted. After all, Draco was doing it now.

"And why should I do this for you?" All steely hostility again. 

"How about because I'll be negotiating your freedom?" Harry didn't quite manage to keep the edge out of his words.

"Freedom?" There was a bitter undertone to Draco's voice. "You know as well as I do that there will be no freedom for me. For neither of us."

"Well, anything that isn't Azkaban is a start," Harry said decisively. "We can work from there."

Malfoy's eyebrow rose in a way that reminded Harry of his old self. "We, Potter?"

Harry sighed in frustration. "Yes. And if you want to think of something beyond yourself, think of Crabbe. The Ministry wants you both."

A frown marred Malfoy's forehead. "Vince? He's here?"

"Hermione Apparated him out of Tintagel before it collapsed," said Harry. 

"What about the others?" For a moment, Draco's eyes went unfocussed. He looked out of the window. "Flint? Macnair?"

"You'll have to ask Ron." Harry replied. "Though I don't think he'll tell you. He hasn't told me either." Not in so many words.

"I see." Whatever expression had animated Malfoy's features for a moment shut down at once. He slid down from the headboard and rolled to the side, showing Harry his back and pulling the coverlet up over his shoulders. 

"Go to sleep, Potter," he told the wall. "And you'll want to speak to Scrimgeour soon – I don't know how long I'll have the patience for self-control."

***

Outside, Harry was grateful to see that no one was waiting for him but the mirror, and he pointedly ignored that. He was worn out, the echoes of Malfoy's mental attack still fizzing around in his brain.

Slowly, he wandered down towards the entrance hall, where he found Hermione struggling with a large eagle owl. The envelope in her hand was heavy and cream coloured, bearing the official seal of the Minister for Magic. The owl, a flustered and baleful-looking bird, resisted all attempts to shoo it out of the owl-flap. It pecked Hermione's fingers, then fluttered off to circle her, determined not to leave without a response. Shielding her face against owl wings, Hermione shoved the envelope at Harry to grab the bird and evict it with both hands. 

"Wait a moment," Harry said, wrestling the offended ball of feathers from her with a reproachful click of his tongue. Yellow eyes glared at him. "Would you mind dropping a note to Rufus Scrimgeour that if he came by, say, tomorrow afternoon, I'd like to have a word with him?" 

Hermione nodded, relief and worry warring on her face, and tore the envelope open. Grateful that he wasn't being asked to read the letter – in his state, the lines would undoubtedly run together and blur before his eyes – Harry watched her scan the parchment. The owl relaxed and landed on Harry's shoulder, where it continued glaring, stiff and unhappy, until Hermione pulled a quill out of her robe and rummaged for a bit of parchment. Only then did Harry manage to unload the bird onto the messenger perch by the door. 

"How did it go?" Hermione asked after folding the parchment and sticking it into the envelope with a quick sealing charm. "With Malfoy, I mean".

"Oh... he kind of said he won't fry my brain until I've spoken to Scrimgeour," Harry replied with a shrug. "That's good, I guess."

The corners of Hermione's mouth curved up a little. "Go to sleep, Harry," she said gently. "You need it."

He smiled and fled to his room, where he fell asleep without even remembering that he had gone near the bed. Though blood-soaked and dark, his dreams didn't rise to the surface until grief sliced into him and he woke with a sob. He sat up, disentangling himself from the covers. The earlier dreams might have been his own – he certainly had cause for nightmares. The one that had woken him, however? Not likely. 

He'd gone to sleep in his clothes, and now fished around for the trainers he must have kicked off before falling onto the mattress. Then he padded off towards Draco's room through the nightly quiet of Grimmauld Place, only interrupted by the pitter-patter of raindrops against the windows. 

A single candle burned on Draco's nightstand, guarded by Agha, who had nodded off in the chair beside the bed. She jumped up when Harry closed the door, but he waved her back down into the seat. 

Draco was curled up tightly under the covers, his face to the wall and his hair almost indistinguishable from the white pillow. 

Harry slid to his knees next to Agha's chair. "Nightmares?" he murmured.

She shifted uneasily on the too-large seat, then whispered back, "Master Malfoy was dreaming badly. Agha woke him when he cried out, but he said to leave him alone." Her ears drooped a little. 

Harry patted her unhurt hand reassuringly and crept over to Draco's bedside. Draco's breaths came quick and shallow, and when Harry lightly curled his hand around the fist he'd clenched in the bedclothes, he could feel his tension. 

He wasn't sure whether he could do anything to help calm the other boy. After Bellatrix had cursed him, Harry had woken with Draco curled around him and his mere touch had made him feel better. The entire night had been a blur of agony, and only Draco's presence had made it bearable – wrapping himself around Harry, feeding him potion that soothed the after-effects of Cruciatus. Redimio Cordis didn't make Draco attuned to Harry's emotions, he'd been told again and again – and he certainly wouldn't react well if he knew Harry was sitting at his bedside. Still, Harry thought he could feel Draco's clenched fingers loosening as he stroked them carefully with his thumb. The uneven breaths slowed, steadied. 

Silence and darkness made his own eyelids droop. It took Harry surprising effort to let go of the other boy's hand. But if Draco woke and found him here, he'd probably try to rip his throat out. Harry rose and stopped to whisper to Agha, "Thanks for watching over him." Even as she looked away uneasily, he slipped out of the door as quietly as he had come.

When he crawled back into his bed to pay tribute to exhaustion, he slept without interruption.

***

He woke to bright daylight, feeling more rested than he had since the fight in the Riddle House. The sun caressed his face as he peered out of the dirty window, which made it at least noon. His stomach rumbled, and he followed the faint smell of fried bacon down to the kitchen. It was empty, but next to the stove sat one of the Black's huge silver serving dishes under its charmed cover.

Harry lifted it to uncover scrambled eggs, bacon, toast and grilled chipolatas, all still steaming. His stomach growled appreciatively. 

He was halfway through his plate and a pot of tea when Hermione wandered in, three heavy spellbooks under her arm and a quill stuck behind her ear.

"How are you feeling?" she asked, stealing a piece of chipolata from his plate. 

"Better than in weeks," he admitted, chasing his remaining scrambled eggs onto his last bit of toast before nodding at the stack of books, all of which bore the Hogwarts crest on their spines. "Did you raid the Restricted Section?"

Hermione's mouth quirked up. "I convinced Acting Headmaster Slughorn to let me borrow them. Poor Madam Pince acted as if I was trying to abduct her firstborn." 

"Anything useful?" As hard as he tried not to get his hopes up, Harry felt it surging in his chest.

Hermione grimaced and pulled out a slender, dust-covered volume. "Even Autobiotus Glaspell's _Redimio Cordis_ does nothing except listing historical cases where it was used. The Blacks and Malfoys have quite a few chapters, but it's all about the casters, not the victims. They seem to have been mostly bodyguards or mistresses or frontline duellists. None of them lived very long." She paused and swallowed "But no word about the ritual itself, and not even a hint at a cure. When I talked to Slughorn, he said that even without the Ministry censoring information about spells it has outlawed, ritual magic isn't set up to be undone."

Harry forced himself to shrug. "It can't be helped, I guess. Even the Malfoys didn't know much about how the curse actually worked. We'll just have to go by trial and error." He finished his toast and carried the empty plate over to the sink. "Did Scrimgeour reply?"

Hermione nodded. "He'll be here in-" she looked at her wristwatch, "-in about an hour, actually. I'll be surprised if he dares to show without a bodyguard of Aurors. I think your return made him very, very nervous."

"It should," Harry muttered darkly. Lucius had rubbed it in altogether too much in how little the Minister for Magic had pushed for Harry's release.

"There is something I haven't told you." Hermione hesitated, then blurted out, "He's arrested Kingsley."

"What?" Harry yelled. "What for?"

"Assault," Hermione replied with uncharacteristic glee. "Kingsley was giving interviews to the _Daily Prophet_ about how the Ministry abandoned you after saving their hides, and when Scrimgeour called him in and tried to intimidate him, Kingsley slugged him." She bit her lip and looked at the floor. "Back then Ron and I were so preoccupied with finding you, and with Professor McGonagall still in St Mungo's Spell Damage Ward and Snape gone, no one was there to stop them." She fell silent, looking stricken.

Harry swallowed. He'd seen Snape die in the Riddle House, victim of Voldemort's rage for bringing Harry in to battle the Dark Lord. His hatred for the greasy git had died that day, and he'd gladly put up with the acerbic comments to have the man at his back now. 

"Damn," he muttered. "I just wish I had something to bargain with." 

Hermione reached for his hand, and he managed to evade the touch by reaching for his mug. "You do!" she insisted. "You're the one who defeated Voldemort for him, and in return he let you down." Her usually warm brown eyes were dark with anger.

He gave her a weak smile from behind the rim of the teacup. "I'll see you when he turns up, then. But I should have a word with Ron beforehand."

"There's something wrong with him, isn't there?" Her knuckles were white when she took the empty mug from him.

"I think I know what it is," Harry agreed. "If I'm right, he really can't tell you about it. Not without..." He made a chopping gesture at his throat and fell silent, watching her eyes narrow, then widen as understanding crept in. He felt her eyes on his back as he made for the door, but she didn't call him back.

He found Ron in Grimmauld Place's downstairs duelling hall, where he was casting spells with Bellatrix Lestrange's wand. Harry waited until he'd completed a series of banishing spells that made the air crackle with power. 

"Are you going to keep it?"

Ron looked at him over his shoulder. "I don't know. It's really powerful, but I keep waiting for it to turn on me if I'm not fully concentrating." A lopsided grin flicked across his face. "And it doesn't suit me at all. Apart from supporting power over skill, Hermione would say."

"Perhaps you should hang on to it as a second wand, and get another one that's tailored to you," Harry suggested. 

"It'll probably come handy if we go up against the Ministry," Ron said. 

"Scrimgeour is coming to see us in a bit," Harry pointed out. "Did Hermione tell you?"

Ron looked at the wall. "I should better stay away."

Harry took a few steps to stand beside him. "I think we should confront him once and for all," he said. "To give him no excuse to keep asking questions."

"You don't understand!" Ron's bottom lip wavered. "They're not going to take our word on this. They'll insist on Veritaserum, and I... I can't!"

Harry shook his head in exasperation. "I get it! Give me a little credit."

Ron's face was pale. "That's what _he_ said, you know? That I could never communicate the truth to anyone or, well... Apart from you. He said you'd probably figure it out anyway."

Harry felt his cheeks flame, not quite knowing what caused it – that Lucius Malfoy had known him this well? Or that he'd trusted him so much? Even dead, the bastard still filled him with conflicting emotions.

Ron pushed his hand through his hair and looked away. "But if I refuse to take Veritaserum, Scrimgeour will _know_ I'm hiding something."

"How about an allergy?" Harry asked, wracking his brain. "Bellatrix force-fed you the phial you brought – we could say it made you really sick."

Ron whipped around. "There was no Veritaserum."

Harry's forehead crinkled. "But I saw it. Lucius _tested_ it."

"Oh yes, he did, didn't he?" A dark grin that held no humour whatsoever tugged at the corner of Ron's mouth. "He knew perfectly well that it was just water."

Harry turned away with an abrupt motion to hide his expression. He barely managed not to bash his fist into the wall. That _bastard_ had planned this from the moment he'd seen Ron being dragged into the dungeons, and suddenly his insistence of have Harry one last time and his contradictory behaviour all fell into place. It had been Lucius' last night alive, and he'd _known_ it.

"He's dead, Harry," Ron insisted. He raised an arm as if to touch Harry's shoulder, and let it fall again when Harry flinched back. "Whatever he did to you, he's gone!"

"He didn't just fuck me, Ron." Harry could see Ron recoil at the words, and had to stuff his clenched fists into his pockets to hide how badly he was shaking. "He fucked me over in every way you can imagine. He _played_ with me." At this point, he had to force himself to stare at the window, because he couldn't bear to look at the emotion that might show on Ron's face. It would be hard to imagine what would be worse – horror, or pity, or revulsion. 

"He played with my body, with my mind, with my emotions," he forced himself to continue, eyes fixed on the dirty bricks of Number Ten, only an arm's length away. "Hell, he plotted his own death and made me execute it. Like a..." His voice broke, "... like a fucking _wand_!" 

Putting it into words left him trembling; he hid his hands in his robe pockets to stop himself from showing how much. His teeth wanted to chatter. He bit his tongue instead.

"And then he expects me to hide that from Draco."

"Tell him the truth, then!"

Harry's head whipped around. "What?" he snapped. "That his father committed suicide by proxy to give him a shot at redemption? How d'you think that would make him feel? I could never do that to him."

"You'd rather have him hate you and fry your brain whenever he feels like it?" Ron laughed bitterly. "You know, Harry, I couldn't quite believe in that curse, no matter how much they gloated about it. But they really fucked with your head."

"Do you still trust me?" Harry hoped against hope that he didn't sound as small and lost as he felt. 

Ron paused for a moment, as if mulling over the question. "Yes," he said at last. "You've got a blind spot where Malfoy is concerned, and I guess I'll have to live with that. But you're still Harry." He tucked Bellatrix's wand away into his belt sheath. "I'll stop you, if that changes."

A nervous prickle ran over Harry's skin, but he ignored it. "I want you to," he assured. "I'll see you when Scrimgeour calls?" 

Ron nodded, but didn't follow him out of the hall.

***

Despite Ron's assurance, Harry stepped into an empty reception room when the sound of the snake-shaped brass knocker announced the arrival of the Minister for Magic. From the lack of wards going off, it sounded as if Scrimgeour had indeed come alone; or rather, he’d sent away his Aurors before knocking. The tinny sound echoed through the house.

Harry and Hermione exchanged a look, then Hermione got up to open the door. Harry was grateful for that; he wasn’t sure he could have met Scrimgeour alone without hexing him on the spot. 

For a long moment, he wondered whether Ron would turn up at all, but then he slipped in through the carpeted back door just as footsteps sound in the corridor and came to stand behind Harry. The door to the hallway swung open and the Minister for Magic stalked in, followed by Hermione.

Scrimgeour looked insultingly unchanged – the same sharp profile, leonine mane of hair. _This is the man who left you to a lifetime of slavery_ , Lucius's voice whispered inside Harry's head, and Harry's stomach cramped in anger. If Scrimgeour read it in his expression, he didn't betray a sign.

"I am very glad to see you alive and safe, Mr Potter," he said calmly. Ron snorted at Harry's side, and Scrimgeour added, "And _you_ , Mr Weasley, even though you endangered yourself through your own reckless behaviour."

"We found Harry," Ron shot back. "You didn't even try."

Scrimgeour gave Ron a pitying look, then turned to Harry.

"You still look rather exhausted, Mr Potter – wouldn't you rather sit?"

"No," Harry said coldly.

"Very well, let's not draw this out, then. I am here to ask you a few questions, and to take into custody the two surviving Death Eaters Malfoy and Crabbe."

"We'll see about the questions," Harry said, all too aware of the spike of apprehension that went through him at the mention of Draco's name. "But Draco Malfoy and Vincent Crabbe are no Death Eaters, and both are under my protection."

"I don't think you have the authority to offer anyone protection, Mr Potter."

"I defeated Voldemort," Harry stated, and even though Scrimgeour hid it well, he caught the flicker of unease at the name.

"That is true, and the wizarding world owes you gratitude for it." Scrimgeour squared his shoulders. "Do you claim a position of power as his successor?" 

Blood shot into Harry's face. "No!" he snapped. "'But the wizarding world owes me a favour at least, don't you think?" 

"It does indeed," Scrimgeour nodded. "But as Minister for Magic, I owe it to the wizarding world to protect it from its enemies, Mr Potter. My predecessors have shown leniency to Death Eater suspects, and it has led to a second war. I will not repeat their mistakes."

"They're just kids," Harry insisted. "Dragged into this by their fathers. They didn’t willingly take the Dark Mark. They had no _choice_!"

"I am sure that all extenuating circumstances will be raised at their trial."

Harry's mouth thinned. "There won't be any trial."

Scrimgeour sighed and lowered himself into the nearest armchair. "Please – sit."

Harry hesitated for a long moment, then settled down against the armrest of the couch. Hermione sat down beside him, her back stiff, and Ron shifted closer until Harry could feel his hands on the headrest just beside his neck. He didn't sit, though.

"I am concerned, Mr Potter, that your judgement might be somewhat impaired in this matter," Scrimgeour said.

Unease squirmed in Harry's stomach. "It's not. They had no more choice than I had."

Scrimgeour's expression shifted to one of pity. "We know about the Redimio Cordis curse, Mr Potter."

Harry felt the blood drain from his face. His lips went cold, numb. He couldn't speak. 

"Oh, you hid it quite well," the Minister rumbled, "but the Ministry still has a certain influence at Hogwarts, and when your friend Miss Granger decided to use the library to research your condition, word reached us about the topic of her inquiry."

Hermione tensed beside Harry. "You spied on me?" 

"The situation required caution," Scrimgeour shrugged. "And our concerns were borne out."

Harry was still cold, disconnected as if he was floating half outside his body. 

"It makes no difference," he said. "You'd have to fight me to take Malfoy."

"And you'd be going along with his delusions?" Scrimgeour's sharp, pale eyes slid to Hermione, then up to Ron. "I did not think that Mr Weasley would be similarly vulnerable to a family curse, but if he, too, is affected-"

"He's _not_!" Harry cried. "I'm the one they put under a spell. Ron, they just tortured."

He could feel Ron's knuckles tightening on the leather headboard beside him, and realised he'd cut too close to the truth, re-opened too raw a wound. But Scrimgeour's lips compressed for a moment, and he fell silent.

"And if you know anything about the curse," Harry pushed on, if more softly, "you'll know that if Malfoy dies, so will I. If he suffers, I do too. I don't know _what_ the Ministry thinks it owes me for getting rid of Voldemort, but I think it's a bit more than that."

"I _am_ aware of the difficulties," Scrimgeour snapped. "There is the Water of Lethe-"

"We tried sleeping potions," Hermione interrupted, her tone edged. "Harry was still affected."

"I did have word with the Unspeakables in charge of historical spells and potions," Scrimgeour ploughed on. "They contend that there is an 80 per cent likelihood that the Dementor's Kiss would leave you unaffected as it has no physical effect as long as Malfoy's body is being kept alive. And without any emotions on his part to impact on you-"

Something icy closed its claws around Harry's heart. "I can't believe you'd even dare to suggest that." He shook his head, aware that his hands were shaking again. He closed them into fists on his thighs. "That _is_ unspeakable."

A flash of anger raced across Scrimgeour's face. "Merely pragmatic. I don't think you quite comprehend the seriousness of your situation, Mr Potter. In the past, Redimio Cordis not just bound wizards and removed their ability to make independent decisions. They lost their status as wizards; they became _property_ , unable to inherit, to own anything, to enter into a contract. I hear that you have a young witch waiting for you in Ottery St Catchpole – bound by Redimio Cordis, you won't be able to marry her, or own Grimmauld Place, or lay claim to the funds your parents left you."

Harry let out a bark of laughter. "Do you think the Ministry will do itself any favours trying to disinherit me for falling victim to a curse? Somehow I think that the _Daily Prophet_ would have a field day." He suppressed a grin when he saw Scrimgeour's expression darken. "As for Ginny," he added, "I can't imagine her giving a damn about the Ministry's permission if she decides she wants to be with me."

If she still did, after what had happened. If he, Harry, could re-learn how to touch another person apart from Draco.

"Could you be trusted to be in a relationship with anyone as long as the Malfoy boy controls you?" the Minister echoed his thoughts in an eerie way.

"The curse wasn't Malfoy's idea," Harry protested reflexively. "His _father_ put it on us when he was still in shock from the battle. He doesn't like it any more than I do."

"What about Mr Crabbe?" Scrimgeour asked. "I assume _his_ detainment will not discomfort you, Mr Potter?"

And just like that, Harry had enough. His mouth twisted into a thin, angry line, and from the tightening of Scrimgeour's jaw, he knew he looked just as angry as he felt. 

"Minister, I sacrificed my parents, my childhood and my entire life to the fight against Voldemort." His words were rational, but the growl in his voice was not. "Perhaps I did not expect to survive. But I will not sacrifice the rest of my life just so you can continue your feud against children. Lucius Malfoy is _dead_." Saying it outright made Harry aware of a tiny, bitter knot somewhere in his throat. He swallowed. " _I_ killed him. And if I'm able to let it rest there, so will you. It's _enough_!" 

"I did not," Scrimgeour growled, "leave you behind to pursue a vendetta against children!" 

"Oh, but we were _there_ ," Ron cut in for the first time in a while. 

"Malfoy all but outright offered to surrender if you agreed to an amnesty for the kids," Hermione took over from him. "And you refused."

"It was a distraction. He wouldn't have surrendered," Scrimgeour insisted.

"You're wrong," Harry said, with deadly certainty. "But the question is, can you afford having the accusation hanging over you in public? For the rest of your career? How long do you think that might last?" 

"If," Scrimgeour growled, " _if_ I should agree to leave the two at your mercy, it will have to be under Auror supervision."

Harry gave him a smile full of teeth. "I hoped you'd be saying that. I want Kingsley for that. You want him out of your hair, and he's just about the only one of your lot I'd be willing to have around."

"Mr Shacklebolt is no longer working for us," the Minister hissed. 

"Perhaps you should reconsider that?" Hermione threw in, leaning forward. Her bushy pony tail tickled Harry's shoulder. "You won't be able to hold him much longer, and imagine how embarrassing it would be if you tried to put _him_ on trial for trying to speak out for the saviour of the wizarding world." 

"Very well, then." Scrimgeour spread his hands as if to ward him off. "The Ministry for Magic will grant you custody over Malfoy and Goyle, and I will have Mr Shacklebolt seconded to this task after an official reprimand." His expression was very sour, Harry noticed. "Can I make absolutely clear, though, that this agreement will not survive any further attempts to stir up discontent against wizarding government in various seditious publications? On his or your end?" 

Hermione leaned forward. "The _Quibbler_ ," she said, "came out against Voldemort before anybody else. It is more loyal than most."

"The wizarding world is in dire need of stability after years of war," Scrimgeour huffed. "Internal feuding has damaged us before – I will not let that happen again. And as long as there are Death Eaters outside Azkaban, there can be no peace. Which brings me to my final point…" After a pregnant pause, he went on, "The deaths of Malfoy and Bellatrix Lestrange are a matter of record. My men saw the bodies. Others, however, are missing. Macnair, Goyle, Flint… Auror Williamson tells me that Mr Weasley claims they died in the fall of Tintagel – but we have only his word for it." The aristocratic nose wrinkled for a moment. "He wasn't entirely convinced."

Harry couldn't see Ron tensing behind him; he felt it. 

"Goyle died from his injuries from the battle," he lied. "And as for the others…"

"I got lucky," Ron rasped. "Flint turned up to provoke me, and I grabbed his wand." He was wearing a black turtleneck that hid his throat, so there was no telling whether his telltale flush was there. "I managed to stun him and run, straight into Macnair. He didn't expect me at all, and I hit him before he could hit me. I left them there and ran. I just wanted to escape." He bit his lip; convincing enough, but not enough for Harry to buy it." I didn't expect Malfoy to blow the place up. I can't prove they drowned. I just know they did."

"I'm sure a dose of Veritaserum would iron out any remaining concerns," Scrimgeour commented.

Ron laughed, low and contemptuous. "I owe you nothing. You did nothing to help Harry; your goons showed up after we'd already escaped. I don't give a damn about what you want, and I certainly won't take Veritaserum because you ask for it."

Harry felt Scrimgeour's eyes burn into him. There was a high colour in his face. "What he said," Harry shrugged. "You said that you didn't want another war. This is where you've got to decide whether you want to start one." He leaned back against the leather upholstery of the couch, enjoying the cool, soft embrace. It would be good to be able to go to sleep like this. "Me, I don't have anything to lose."

"You, Mr Potter, are still a foolish child in spite of your achievements." Scrimgeour rose to his feet. "I hope, for your sake as much as for anybody else's, that you will be able to control the Malfoy boy. Because if he has to be destroyed, you will have to pay the price for it." 

He turned to the door, cloak swirling angrily behind him, and stalked from the room. After a second, Hermione went after him, not without casting a slow, relieved smile at Harry and Ron. 

Ron's hand slipped on the leather headboard and came to rest on Harry's shoulder for a quick squeeze. Harry forced himself not to tense, and succeeded. 

"I'll go and help her re-set the wards," he whispered. "Just to make sure he doesn't hit us with a squad of Aurors after all. Will you be all right?"

"Sure." Harry turned his head and managed a weak smile. "That went better than I'd hoped."

"No matter what he says, he still fucked you over," Ron snarled across his shoulder on his way to the door. "I won't forget that."

"I won't either," Harry said, half to himself as he extricated himself from the couch. He made his way up to the first landing, leaning heavily on the carved wooden bannister like an old man. Exhaustion crashed over him as the adrenaline he'd been riding on evaporated in a rush. He leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. He felt as if he wanted to slide down, curl up on the hardwood floor and sleep for a year. 

But he didn't have a year. In a year's time, he wanted to see Kingsley Shacklebolt elected as Minister for Magic. He wanted his own reputation cleared of whatever stains the Redimio Cordis had left on it, and Draco Malfoy rehabilitated as an if not respectable, then at least an accepted member of wizarding society. 

A flutter ran through his stomach. No, he barely had a minute. Sighing, he pushed himself away from the wall and started down the corridor. 

Crabbe was lurking outside the door to his room on the guest floor.

"How'd it go?" he asked. There were dark rings under his eyes, and he looked less bulky, somehow. Almost as wretched as Harry felt.

"You're safe," Harry said. "They've agreed to put you under house arrest for the moment, with an Auror guard. But it's Kingsley," he added when Crabbe's eyes hooded. "He's one of us. And there won't be a trial."

Crabbe growled in acknowledgement, and the tense line of his jaw eased a little. "Malfoy?"

"The same." A thin smile curved Harry's mouth. "Scrimgeour found it preferable to civil war."

"You'd have gone that far for him?"

Harry paused for a moment, then shrugged. "Yeah."

"So you've forgiven him? The Minister, I mean?"

Harry felt his smile turn grim. "No. I want him out of office. Actually, I think Kingsley would make a good Minister. Seems like a good project while I'm stuck here learning how to deal with that bloody curse." He cocked his head. "You want in?"

Crabbe grimaced, and Harry wondered if that was his thoughtful face.

"You'd want me?"

Harry snorted. "If I'm going up against what I guess will be most of wizarding society, I can't afford being choosy."

Crabbe let out a gruff laugh that made him look younger somehow. "Yeah, I think I want in."

"Have a word with Hermione," Harry suggested. "She's the one with the plans. And now I…" He inclined his head towards the door of Draco's room. Crabbe coloured a little which made Harry wish he could sink into the floor like a ghost to escape the memories, and nodded. 

Harry more fled to than entered Draco's room, and felt the barriers between them fall as soon as he saw Draco standing at the window. He grabbed the door handle behind him to stop from falling. Emotions hissed through him like spells – fear, loss, a helpless sort of anger.

Draco was looking out of the window at the charmless, dirty front of houses that made up Grimmauld Place, his back to Harry. His hair had grown longer, bright strands falling to the collar of his robe. He needed a haircut; or perhaps a few more weeks until it was long enough to braid. Harry stifled a sob by biting into his fist, and forced himself to take a few deep breaths to calm the rolling in his stomach.

When he could breathe without risking being sick, he took a few quiet steps and leaned his back against the carved post of the four-poster a few feet behind Draco. 

"I saw him leave," Draco said after a moment of uneasy silence. "He didn't look happy."

"He's not. He didn't get what he wanted."

"What did he get?" Draco sounded casual, almost light. If Harry hadn't been able to feel the thrum of anxiety underneath the façade, he might have been fooled.

"You under house arrest here for the time being," Harry admitted. "With Kingsley Shacklebolt of the Order to supervise it." He rubbed his forehead where an ache was forming. "You'll be safe. And it'll give us time to…" Draco's sharp rush of displeasure made him shiver. "Time to figure out how to deal with the curse." 

"As your prisoner."

"As my responsibility." 

"You hate me."

Harry bit his tongue at the raw, sick twist the accusation produced. "I don't hate you. I can't."

"What if you could ? If there was no curse?" Harry opened his mouth to answer, then thought about it. He _wanted_ to believe that his decision would be the same, but wasn't certain. But he couldn't search the feelings of the person he'd been then. That Harry was dead and gone. He shrugged.

"It'll work out somehow."

"You killed my father, Potter." Draco's voice dropped into a soft growl, and Harry couldn't help but shudder. "How do you expect us to work around that?"

Harry swallowed, and said nothing. 

"You were drained, curse-struck… It should never have happened that way."

"He tried to kill Ron and me - I didn't mean to do it," Harry said. He hesitated an indeterminate second. "It was an accident."

Draco whirled around and the burst of rage that hit Harry would have slammed him backwards even without the back of Draco's hand impacting on his face. He wavered and stumbled, overcome with the sudden urge to fall to his knees and cower. Instead, he grabbed the bedpost and pulled himself upright. 

"Don't lie to me!" Draco snarled, his face a feral mask as if he only barely held back from throwing himself at Harry. "I know what he did. I'm not _stupid_. I know that he broke your defences and set you up and then pushed your buttons until you did it. Because of me." He balled his fist as if preparing to strike again. Harry fell back under the blow although it never happened. "I don't want your pity, Potter!"

Harry felt the anger kindle that had boiled so close to the surface during his talk with Scrimgeour. "That's tough, Malfoy, because you have it." Malfoy's head whipped around, an offended look spreading over his face. "I can't help it. I feel what you feel. And if it helps, I hate him for it just as much as you. It's a shitty thing to do to your son, no matter what reason." He took a deep breath. "But I'm not sorry that it worked either."

"I am." Draco's face had turned back to the window. He was struggling to rein in his emotions, to stuff them back behind the barriers that locked Harry out. "I'd rather be on the run with him, or in Azkaban, than know he's dead. I wish you were dead instead of him."

"I know," Harry said. "But it's too late now."

He stepped closer to Draco, leaning on the other side of the window sill to see what mesmerised the Slytherin's attention. There was nothing to see but the flickering reflection of a television in the window of Grimmauld Place 13 on the other side of the road.

"Can we try to go somewhere from here?" he asked. 

Draco exhaled, shrugged. His shields had closed. Harry couldn't feel anything at all. 

"Somewhere where I grovel to the 'light side' and the Ministry for forgiveness for my sins?" Draco snorted subtly. "I don’t think so, Potter." Before Harry could think of a reply, Draco turned towards him and looked at him directly for the first time. "Somewhere where I swear vengeance on your for my father's death and for poking around in my mind?" He cocked his head, studying Harry thoughtfully. The spark of malicious purpose Harry caught through the link came almost as a relief. "More likely, don't you think?"

"Something in between?" Harry suggested quietly. 

Draco could destroy him with his hatred, that much Harry knew, and all his instincts would make him want to let him. But he couldn't, because it would destroy Draco too. An impossible double-bind of Lucius's making. 

"I don't want my life to be over because of this," Draco said after a few endless minutes of silence. "If your continued existence is the price, I think I can learn to live with that."

He was still staring at Harry as if studying an interesting but ultimately repulsive critter with too many legs. Pressure was rising, bending Harry's spine. He tried hard to resist the urge, but ultimately found himself on his knees again. Draco's clenched fist opened. He reached out to run a careful fingertip over Harry's scar, causing Harry's entire neck to prickle. Only when Draco took his hand back did he notice that the touch hadn't made him flinch.

"If you're the only thing I have power over," Draco said quite softly, turning back to the window, "I won't be able to resist using it." 

This time, Harry bit on his tongue until he tasted blood to prevent himself from reflexively going along with whatever Draco asked of him.

"Didn't you do enough already?" Harry hit back, forcing himself to spit out every word that wanted to stick on his tongue. He could still recall the texture of Malfoy's cock under his tongue, feel Malfoy's hand in his hair. His face coloured, to an extent that left Draco without a need to guess what he was talking about.

The Slytherin huffed, softly. "I was very… angry then. Not so much at you." It wasn't an apology, not really, but probably as much as Harry would get. 

"I can't," Harry whispered, shivering. "I don't-"

Draco leaned forward towards the glass pane as if something caught his eye outside, though Harry knew there was nothing. "Let's deal with it if we get there," he said, his voice low and raw. 

Harry wrapped his arms around his shoulders and hugged himself for a moment. It was getting cold. 

Draco tilted his head. "Scared, Potter?"

A huff of laughter escaped Harry in spite of everything. Then he answered, honestly. "Yes. Does that make you feel better?"

A shrug. "Somewhat."

Harry exhaled through his nose. "I don't want my life to be over either," he said. "And I don't just want you rehabilitated out of the goodness of my heart. But the bond may be easier to handle if we're able to put some distance between us."

"And you think Scrimgeour will go for it?" It didn't take an emotional link to sense Draco's scepticism.

"No," Harry said. "But I think his successor will."

"Ambitious." Draco clicked his tongue in honest approval. "Vengeful too. I think I can back you on that, Potter."

Harry relaxed under the approval, and instinctively held out his hand. The Slytherin stared at him for endless moments, and even through the barriers he'd put up to shield himself, Harry could feel his conflict. Then, slowly as if against his own better judgement, he reached out and took Harry's hand in a quick, dry clasp. He let go, almost as quickly.

Very gradually, a sliver of hope started to steal its way into Harry's heart, faint like the stirring of gull wings over the jagged rock in the sea that had once borne Tintagel Castle. 

And in the distance above the waves, lost somewhere among the spray and wind, he could hear Lucius Malfoy laughing.

_~ finis ~_


End file.
